#lipchitz

Jacques Lipchitz was born on this day in 1891. In 1967 the Philadelphia Art Commission invited Lipchitz to design a public sculpture for Thomas Paine Plaza, directly opposite City Hall. The sculptor proposed a monument to the generational struggle to uphold democracy. His work shows men and women of various ages lifting one another toward the sky, straining to support an impossibly heavy waving flag. Lipchitz died in 1973 and the Fairmount Park Art Association (now the Association of Public Art)) completed the project three years later. See this first study of the sculpture in “Rethinking the Modern Monument” at the Rodin Museum and the completed bronze outside the Municipal Services Building, just down the Parkway.

Six.

Happy birthday to Jacques Lipchitz, who was born on this day in 1891. The earliest work by Lipchitz in our collection, "Sailor with Guitar" marks an important transition in the artist's career, in which the vestiges of his academic training gave way to the influence of Cubist painters. This "proto-Cubist" work still retains a degree of realism, however, since it was based on Lipchitz's direct observation of a young Spanish sailor dancing and playing his guitar.

In 1967, the Philadelphia Art Commission invited Jacques Lipchitz, a Lithuanian-born Jewish artist, to design a public sculpture for Thomas Paine Plaza, directly opposite City Hall. The sculptor proposed a monument to the generational struggle to uphold democracy. His work shows men and women of various ages lifting one another toward the sky, straining to support an impossibly heavy waving flag. Lipchitz died in 1973 and the Fairmount Park Art Association (now the Association for Public Art) completed the project three years later. See this first study of the sculpture in “Rethinking the Modern Monument” at the Rodin Museum and the completed bronze outside the Municipal Services Building, just down the Parkway. 

Born on this day in 1891, Jacques Lipchitz is best known as a Cubist sculptor, but in the 1930s and 1940s, his works evolved toward depicting mythological and biblical stories of humans fighting their oppressors. Lipchitz was forced to flee France to escape the Nazi regime, and his work can be seen as a personal response to those events. See Lipchitz's portrait in "Face to Face: Portraits of Artists" and his sculpture on the East Terrace. 

“Jacques Lipchitz,” c. 1945, by Arnold Newman 

At the brink of World War II, Jacques Lipchitz, a Lithuanian Jew, fled for safety and arrived in New York. Lipchitz was a leading Cubist sculptor, but in 1952 a fire in his New York studio basically destroyed all of his works. Fortunately, a plaster of “Prometheus” was in Philadelphia at the time. We purchased this plaster sculpture and commissioned Lipchitz to cast the plaster in bronze, which can be found today at the east entrance of the Museum. Lipchitz was born on this day in 1891.

“Jacques Lipchitz,” c. 1941–45, by Arnold Newman © Arnold Newman Estate