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Bird in Space

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Bird in Space (L'Oiseau dans l'espace) is a series of sculptures by Romanian sculptor Constantin Brâncuși. The original work was created in 1923 and made of marble.[1] This sculpture is also known for containing seven marble figures and nine bronze casts.[2] Brancusi created the piece over 14 times and in several mediums over a period of 20 years.[3] It was sold in 2005 for $27.5 million, at the time a record price for a sculpture sold in an auction.[4][5] The original title in Romanian is Pasărea în văzduh.

Description

In the Bird in Space works, Brâncuși concentrated not on the physical attributes of the bird, but instead on its movement. For example, the sculpture does not feature wings or feathers. The Met's description depicts the art as featuring an "elongated body, and the head and beak are reduced to a slanted oval plane."[6]

The height of the sculpture is 287.7 cm.[8] Seven of the sculptures in the series are made of marble, while the other nine were cast in polished bronze.[9]

Art galleries where the sculptures reside

Discover more about Description related topics

Marble

Marble

Marble is a metamorphic rock consisting of carbonate minerals that recrystallize under the influence of heat, pressure and aqueous solutions, most commonly calcite (CaCO3) or dolomite (CO3)2 and has a crystalline texture of varying thickness. Marble is typically not foliated (layered), although there are exceptions. About 10-15% of the sedimentary rocks on Earth are composed of limestone.

Bronze

Bronze

Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids such as arsenic or silicon. These additions produce a range of alloys that may be harder than copper alone, or have other useful properties, such as strength, ductility, or machinability.

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas and the most-visited museum in the Western Hemisphere. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 Fifth Avenue, along the Museum Mile on the eastern edge of Central Park on Manhattan's Upper East Side, is by area one of the world's largest art museums. The first portion of the approximately 2-million-square-foot (190,000 m2) building was built in 1880. A much smaller second location, The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park in Upper Manhattan, contains an extensive collection of art, architecture, and artifacts from medieval Europe.

New York City

New York City

New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), New York City is the most densely populated major city in the United States and more than twice as populous as Los Angeles, the nation's second-largest city. New York City is located at the southern tip of New York State. It constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the U.S. by both population and urban area. With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within 250 mi (400 km) of the city. New York City is a global cultural, financial, entertainment, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy, and is sometimes described as the capital of the world.

Museum of Modern Art

Museum of Modern Art

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.

Philadelphia Museum of Art

Philadelphia Museum of Art

The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway at Eakins Oval. The museum administers collections containing over 240,000 objects including major holdings of European, American and Asian origin. The various classes of artwork include sculpture, paintings, prints, drawings, photographs, armor, and decorative arts.

National Gallery of Art

National Gallery of Art

The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of charge, the museum was privately established in 1937 for the American people by a joint resolution of the United States Congress. Andrew W. Mellon donated a substantial art collection and funds for construction. The core collection includes major works of art donated by Paul Mellon, Ailsa Mellon Bruce, Lessing J. Rosenwald, Samuel Henry Kress, Rush Harrison Kress, Peter Arrell Browne Widener, Joseph E. Widener, and Chester Dale. The Gallery's collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals, and decorative arts traces the development of Western Art from the Middle Ages to the present, including the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas and the largest mobile created by Alexander Calder.

Seattle Art Museum

Seattle Art Museum

The Seattle Art Museum is an art museum located in Seattle, Washington, United States. It operates three major facilities: its main museum in downtown Seattle; the Seattle Asian Art Museum (SAAM) in Volunteer Park on Capitol Hill, and Olympic Sculpture Park on the central Seattle waterfront, which opened in January 2007.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits.

Norton Simon Museum

Norton Simon Museum

The Norton Simon Museum is an art museum located in Pasadena, California, United States. It was previously known as the Pasadena Art Institute and the Pasadena Art Museum and displays numerous sculptures on its grounds.

Peggy Guggenheim Collection

Peggy Guggenheim Collection

The Peggy Guggenheim Collection is an art museum on the Grand Canal in the Dorsoduro sestiere of Venice, Italy. It is one of the most visited attractions in Venice. The collection is housed in the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, an 18th-century palace, which was the home of the American heiress Peggy Guggenheim for three decades. She began displaying her private collection of modern artworks to the public seasonally in 1951. After her death in 1979, it passed to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, which opened the collection year-round from 1980.

National Gallery of Australia

National Gallery of Australia

The National Gallery of Australia (NGA), formerly the Australian National Gallery, is the national art museum of Australia as well as one of the largest art museums in Australia, holding more than 166,000 works of art. Located in Canberra in the Australian Capital Territory, it was established in 1967 by the Australian Government as a national public art museum. As of 2022 it is under the directorship of Nick Mitzevich.

Constantin Brancusi vs the United States

In 1926, Bird in Space was the subject of a court battle over its taxation by U.S. Customs.[3] In October 1926, Bird in Space, along with 19 other Brâncuși sculptures, arrived in New York harbor aboard the steamship Paris.[10] While works of art are not subject to custom duties, the customs officials refused to believe that the tall, thin piece of polished bronze was art. Therefore, the officials imposed the tariff for manufactured metal objects, 40% of the sale price or about $230[11] (over $3130 in 2016 U.S. dollars).

Marcel Duchamp (who was an artist that accompanied the sculptures from Europe),[12] American photographer Edward Steichen (who was to take possession of Bird in Space after exhibition), and Brâncuși himself were indignant; the sculptures were set to appear at the Brummer Gallery, an avant-garde art gallery in New York City,[13] and then the Arts Club in Chicago. Under pressure from the press and artists, U.S. customs agreed to rethink their classification of the items, releasing the sculptures on bond (under "Kitchen Utensils and Hospital Supplies") until a decision could be reached. However, customs appraiser F. J. H. Kracke eventually confirmed the initial classification of items and said that they were subject to duty. Kracke told the New York Evening Post that "several men, high in the art world were asked to express their opinions for the Government.... One of them told us, 'If that's art, hereafter I'm a bricklayer.' Another said, 'Dots and dashes are as artistic as Brâncuși's work.' In general, it was their opinion that Brâncuși left too much to the imagination."[10] The next month, Steichen filed an appeal to the U.S. Customs' decision to reclaim the money.[14]

Under the 1922 Tariff Act, for a sculpture to count as duty-free it must be an original work of art, with no practical purpose, made by a professional sculptor.[10] No one argued that the piece had a practical purpose, but whether or not the sculpture was art was hotly contested. The 1916 case United States v. Olivotti had established that sculptures were art only if they were carved or chiseled representations of natural objects "in their true proportions." Therefore, a series of artists and art experts testified for both the defense and the prosecution about the definition of art and who decides exactly what art is.[10]

Charles J. Lane, M. J. Speiser and Thomas M. Lane were Brâncuși's lawyers.[14] Six major figures testified for Brâncuși that Bird in Space was art. They were Edward Steichen, Jacob Epstein, Forbes Watson, Frank Crowninshield, William Henry Fox and Henry McBride. Brâncuși who disliked the public attention did not attend the trial, retreating to his Paris Studio. The government enlisted Robert Aitken and Thomas Jones as witnesses that Bird in Space was not art.[15]

In reply to the court's question as to whether the sculpture was a bird or not, the expert witnesses[16] emphasised that the Bird's 'birdness'[17] was of little relevance. The artists and art experts highlighted the importance of realising the fact that Brâncuși was moving towards abstract works of art, and it is therefore important to take into account what each individual artist is aiming to achieve in their works.

Brâncuși's affidavit to the American Consulate explained the process of creating the piece, establishing its originality:[10]

I conceived it to be created in bronze and I made a plaster model of it. This I gave to the founder, together with the formula for the bronze alloy and other necessary indications. When the roughcast was delivered to me, I had to stop up the air holes and the core hole, to correct the various defects, and to polish the bronze with files and very fine emery. All this I did myself, by hand; this artistic finishing takes a very long time and is equivalent to beginning the whole work over again. I did not allow anybody else to do any of this finishing work, as the subject of the bronze was my own special creation and nobody but myself could have carried it out to my satisfaction.

The purpose of the deposition was to illustrate that the sculpture did indeed comply with the requirements of the Tariff Act of 1922.[14]

There was initially a question over the originality of the piece, as there were four other bird sculptures that Brâncuși had produced.[18] Therefore, it was unclear as to whether this piece of art could be thought of as something which had never been seen before. However, every piece of metal used in the sculptures was unique, which established the threshold of originality.[18] Despite the varied opinions on what qualifies as art presented to the court, in November 1928 Judges Young and Waite found in favor of the artist. The decision drafted by Waite concluded:[19]

The object now under consideration ... is beautiful and symmetrical in outline, and while some difficulty might be encountered in associating it with a bird, it is nevertheless pleasing to look at and highly ornamental, and as we hold under the evidence that it is the original production of a professional sculptor and is in fact a piece of sculpture and a work of art according to the authorities above referred to, we sustain the protest and find that it is entitled to free entry.

This was the first court decision to accept that a non-representational sculpture (abstract) could be considered art.[20]

Another issue concerns the competence of the court to judge the aesthetics of artworks. Is the law competent to resolve the question through legal criteria and evidence established by artists and curators in the courtroom? Overall, Judge Waite concluded that the sculpture was 'beautiful', 'symmetrical' and 'ornamental', and therefore should be considered art.[21][22]

Discover more about Constantin Brancusi vs the United States related topics

Marcel Duchamp

Marcel Duchamp

Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. He is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, as one of the three artists who helped to define the revolutionary developments in the plastic arts in the opening decades of the 20th century, responsible for significant developments in painting and sculpture. He has had an immense impact on 20th- and 21st-century art, and a seminal influence on the development of conceptual art. By the time of World War I, he had rejected the work of many of his fellow artists as "retinal", intended only to please the eye. Instead, he wanted to use art to serve the mind.

Edward Steichen

Edward Steichen

Edward Jean Steichen was a Luxembourgish American photographer, painter, and curator, renowned as one of the most prolific and influential figures in the history of photography.

Arts Club of Chicago

Arts Club of Chicago

Arts Club of Chicago is a private club and public exhibition space located in the Near North Side community area of Chicago, a block east of the Magnificent Mile, that exhibits international contemporary art. It was founded in 1916, inspired by the success of the Art Institute of Chicago's handling of the Armory Show. Its founding was viewed as a statement that art had become an important component of civilized urban life. The Arts Club is said to have been pro-Modernist from its founding. The Club strove to break new ground with its shows, rather than collect the works of established artists as the Art Institute does.

Jacob Epstein

Jacob Epstein

Sir Jacob Epstein was an American-British sculptor who helped pioneer modern sculpture. He was born in the United States, and moved to Europe in 1902, becoming a British subject in 1910.

Frank Crowninshield

Frank Crowninshield

Francis Welch Crowninshield, better known as Frank or Crownie (informal), was an American journalist and art and theater critic best known for developing and editing the magazine Vanity Fair for 21 years, making it a pre-eminent literary journal.

Henry McBride (art critic)

Henry McBride (art critic)

Henry McBride was an American art critic known for his support of modern artists, both European and American, in the first half of the twentieth century. As a writer during the 1920s for the newspaper The New York Sun and the avant-garde magazine The Dial, McBride became one of the most influential supporters of modern art in his time. He also wrote for Creative Art (1928-1932) and Art News (1950-1959). Living to be ninety-five, McBride was born in the era of Winslow Homer and the Hudson River School and lived to see the rise of Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and the New York School.

Court

Court

A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance with the rule of law. In both common law and civil law legal systems, courts are the central means for dispute resolution, and it is generally understood that all people have an ability to bring their claims before a court. Similarly, the rights of those accused of a crime include the right to present a defense before a court.

Sculpture

Sculpture

Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sculptural processes originally used carving and modelling, in stone, metal, ceramics, wood and other materials but, since Modernism, there has been an almost complete freedom of materials and process. A wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by welding or modelling, or moulded or cast.

Affidavit

Affidavit

An affidavit is a written statement voluntarily made by an affiant or deponent under an oath or affirmation which is administered by a person who is authorized to do so by law. Such a statement is witnessed as to the authenticity of the affiant's signature by a taker of oaths, such as a notary public or commissioner of oaths. An affidavit is a type of verified statement or showing, or in other words, it contains a verification, which means that it is made under oath on penalty of perjury, and this serves as evidence for its veracity and is required in court proceedings.

Legacy

Bird in Space was the inspiration for a classical music composition by composer Timothy A. Corpus. This work was premiered at the 2012 architectural festival Open House Chicago, in which the piece was performed throughout the festival at the Arts Club of Chicago.[23]

The American poet, Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980) refers to Brâncuși's "Bird" in her poem, "Reading time: 1 minute 26 seconds" (1939) and uses this link to highlight the fear we have of embracing the new and non-utilitarian in the arts, and to encourage us to break through an unhealthy mind-set so that we may see the world anew: "... The climax when the brain acknowledges the world, / all values extended into the blood awake. / Moment of proof. And as they say Brancusi did, / building his bird to extend through soaring air, / as Kafka planned stories that draw to eternity / through time extended. And the climax strikes. ..." (from A Turning Wind, 1939. Muriel Rukeyser).

Source: "Bird in Space", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, February 18th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird_in_Space.

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References
  1. ^ "Bird in Space". www.metmuseum.org. Retrieved 2021-02-09.
  2. ^ https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/486757
  3. ^ a b "MoMA | "But Is It Art?" Constantin Brancusi vs. the United States". www.moma.org. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  4. ^ "Brâncuși's "Bird in Space" Sets World Auction Record for Sculpture at $27,456,000". Archived from the original on January 24, 2008.
  5. ^ The price record for a Brâncuși masterpiece was set up in 2005 when “Bird in Space” was sold for USD 27.5 M Archived May 14, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  6. ^ Met description of Bird in Space Archived September 25, 2005, at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ "Brancusi's Bird in Space". Smarthistory at Khan Academy. Retrieved December 18, 2012.
  8. ^ National Gallery of Art. "Bird in Space, 1927". National Gallery of Art. Retrieved 2021-02-09.
  9. ^ HARTEL JR, HERBERT R (November 2008). "The Trials of Art by Daniel Mcclean (Ed.)". The Art Book. 15 (4): 46–48. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8357.2008.00992_13.x. ISSN 1368-6267.
  10. ^ a b c d e "Legal Affairs".
  11. ^ "Art: Bird". 31 October 1927. Archived from the original on May 7, 2008 – via www.time.com.
  12. ^ Tate. "Marcel Duchamp". Tate. Retrieved 2021-02-09.
  13. ^ "When Abstract Art Went on Trial: Brancusi v. United States". Shellie Lewis' Blog. 2012-07-14. Retrieved 2021-05-29.
  14. ^ a b c Hartshorne, Thomas (April 1986). "Modernism on Trial: C.Brancusi v United States (1928)". Journal of American Studies. 20 (1): 93–104. doi:10.1017/S0021875800016352. JSTOR 27554707. S2CID 145489352. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
  15. ^ "When Abstract Art Went on Trial: Brancusi v. United States". Shellie Lewis' Blog. 2012-07-14. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  16. ^ Testimony was provided by a number of experts, including the sculpture’s owner, Edward Steichen, an artist and future director of MoMA’s Department of Photography, as well as British sculptor Jacob Epstein and Brooklyn Museum Director William Henry Fox.
  17. ^ Miller, Sanda (2003), "Brancusi, Constantin", Oxford Art Online, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.t010887, retrieved 2021-02-13
  18. ^ a b McClean, Daniel; Avanessian, Armen (2007). "Trials of the Title: The Trials of Brancusi and Veronese". In in Daniel McClean (ed.). The Trials of Art. Ridinghouse. pp. 37–57.
  19. ^ Giry, Stephanie (September–October 2002). "An Odd Bird". Legal Affairs.
  20. ^ "Art Law".
  21. ^ McClean, Avenessian, Daniel, Armen (2007). "Trials of the Title: The Trials of Brancusi and Veronese' in Daniel McClean". Ridinghouse: 37–57.
  22. ^ Lewis, Shellie (2012). "When Abstract Art Went on Trial: Brancusi v. United States". World Press.
  23. ^ "Chicago Architecture Foundation, Classical Composers Team Up for Open House Chicago".
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