Alberto Giacometti, Portrait of Isaku Yanaihara, 1963, Original Lithograph

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Artist: alberto giacometti (1901-1966), d'après

title: "ritratto di isaku yanaihara" (portrait of isaku yanaihara)

year of ideation: 1956
year of … Read more Artist: alberto giacometti (1901-1966), d'après

title: "ritratto di isaku yanaihara" (portrait of isaku yanaihara)

year of ideation: 1956
year of print: 1963

in the original folder

total size: 56 x 45 cm
lithograph size: 50 x 32.5 cm

from the edition of 100

embossed seal (timbre-à-sec) by the publisher

this is an authentic print from 1963, not a later reproduction or giclée.
the present specimen belongs to the special edition of 100 published by einaudi in torino, italy.
numbered 99 in the edition page.

excellent condition, not trimmed, never framed, please see images

from the italian introduction:

one day, before my very eyes, a little girl handed him one of her drawings and, asking for an autograph, handed him a small notebook in exchange. Concerned about matching drawing for drawing, giacometti took the notebook and, without moving from his seat, began to draw in pencil what was before him: the long room in a series of rooms and, at the end, the table with the lamp and the objects therein. For hours he toiled, scratching, puncturing, tearing the sheets of paper, until he achieved, on the smallest space of paper available, the most satisfying result. The little girl, amazed, initially believed he didn't know how to get to the bottom of it, but soon, struck by his concentration, she understood that art could be a game superior to virtuosity. Watching him do everything in his gestures, with restless eye and hand, i dreamed of a giacometti\. Who drew giacometti while he drew.
painting and sculpture, the two parallel and complementary activities, are founded for him on the necessity of drawing. "whether it's painting or sculpture," he states, "what must be said, what i believe, is that ultimately only drawing matters. One must rely solely, exclusively on drawing. If one had a little mastery of drawing, everything else would be possible". This is the profession of faith of the classical tradition, according to which drawing was the common source and basis of all visual acts.

isaku yanaihara (1918-1989) was a professor of philosophy in japan, a specialist of the work of sartre, genet and camus, whose book “l’etranger” he translated into japanese. He met alberto giacometti in paris in 1955, and regularly sat for the artist, in 1956 and then during his summer stays in france in 1957, 1959, 1960 and 1961. In several texts, amongst which an article published in the magazine “derrière le miroir” in 1961, he described those long sittings, the artist and the model trying to mutually exhaust each other. The work on yanaihara’s portrait enabled giacometti to push to the limit his search for “copying a head exactly as one sees it”. The parisian studio of the artist, where yanaihara sat, is recognizable in the painting thanks to the oblique line of the wooden staircase leading to the mezzanine, without the artist giving us other anecdotic details of the place. The attention is focused on the model: enclosed in a painted reframing (a process much used by giacometti), he occupies the lower part of the painting, which accentuates the depth of space. The model’s bust has clearly been worked on several times: the outlines of the first bust are visible under the model’s final silhouette. It appears that gradually, as the artist was working on this portrait, the size of the figure and particularly of the head was reduced. It is a phenomenon typical of the portraits painted by giacometti and particularly for the series of portraits of yanaihara, of which the artist said: “we used to work all day, and by the evening, it was a painting. And the more it worked out, the more he disappeared”. Giacometti probably worked for a while on that portrait: although it is signed and dated 1958, this painting is visible, in its previous states, on photographs taken by yanaihara in 1957. In the same photographs, one also sees another painting, close to this one, with the same framing, probably abandoned after. Another old photograph shows this portrait completed without a date or a signature, which indicates those were appended by the artist at a later date, probably for an exhibition.
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the listing if for the authentic lithograph as described, in the original folder. The picture of the edition number is posted in order to show the limited edition only. This piece has an attribution mark,
i am sure that it is completely authentic and take full responsibility for any authenticity
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