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Right now at the Seattle Art Museum, there’s a show of Alberto Giacometti‘s artworks. His drawings, paintings, and sculptures will be on display at SAM until October 9th. This is the second in a series of posts about Alberto Giacometti, who lived from 1901 – 1966.

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Sculptures by Diego Giacometti

Alberto Giacometti had a brother, Diego, who was also an artist. Diego was known for his bronze figures and animals.

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Alberto Giacometti’s studies of Diego

Alberto Giacometti studied figures daily, and most of his artwork was repetitive studies of the same people. His models sat for many hours while he worked and reworked their forms, so they had to be people Alberto enjoyed spending time with. His muses were his closest companions, people who had influence over his work and life.

Alberto’s favorite model was his younger brother and closest friend, Diego Giacometti (1902-1985). Diego sat for Alberto every day until Alberto’s death in 1966. From sessions with Diego, Alberto made drawings, paintings, and sculptures. He’d scratch forms into his studio wall, he’d draw on paper and in books. He’d sculpt in plaster, clay, and wood. Below are just a few examples of his countless and diligent studies.

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Although I couldn’t locate specific dates for all the studies, I tried to organize the sculptures roughly by year, based on the features, and the hair on Diego’s head.

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Alberto would scrape into clay and plaster with sharp trowels, pointers, and pencils, and even draw graphite lines into the surface of the face: lines he imagined within the form. You can see planes of the head here, in which the curves of the face are blocked out into flat facets – a standard exercise for artists that chases out the squishy soft blending of “here-ish” mushy shapes, it teaches us how to find the essential form in three dimensions. Alberto does this to the extent that the process of finding and marking the lines become what the sculpture is about, even more than the likeness it relays. See below, how the marks take over.