Alberto Giacometti – Material und Vision

Although he is best known for his signature bronze sculptures, Alberto Giacometti (1901–66) worked in a variety of other media such as marble, plaster, and wood. Plaster was of particularly great importance to Giacometti’s work. It offered many advantages as a medium, the foremost being that it allowed the artist to rework or repaint his sculptures in a variety of ways. More than an intermediate stage between clay model and bronze cast, plaster was therefore often regarded by Giacometti as a primary medium, and many of his works exist only in plaster.

Alberto Giacometti – Material und Vision is based on a gift by Bruno Giacometti of seventy-five plaster sculptures to Kunsthaus Zürich, where they have been extensively restored and researched. With more than two hundred illustrations, including many in large format and full color, the book features masterpieces from every stage of Giacometti’s career. Apart from the book’s main focus—the place of plaster in the artist’s oeuvre—it also includes works in marble, bronze, and wood. Together, these sculptures show how Giacometti approached the material properties of the different media and offer insight into the creative process of one of the twentieth century’s greatest artists.

Published to accompany a major exhibition at Kunsthaus Zürich, Alberto Giacometti – Material und Vision celebrates a lesser-known, yet fundamentally important aspect of the artist’s work.