Bird in Space

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© Succession Brancusi - All rights reserved (ARS)
My gallery Comment Tag Order Photography*
© Succession Brancusi - All rights reserved (ARS)
My gallery Comment Tag Order Photography*
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Bird in Space

France, 1927, cast later
Sculpture
Polished bronze, cast number 4/5
Height: 73 in (185.4 cm); diameter: 8 in. (20.32 cm)
Partial, fractional and promised gift of Janice and Henri Lazarof (M.2005.70.13)
Modern Art
Currently on public view:
Broad Contemporary Art Museum, floor 3

Since gallery displays may change often, please contact us before you visit to make certain this item is on view.

Label

Constantin Brancusi’s sculptures of simplified subjects, perfected and idealized, often convey the essence of things over their external appearance....
Constantin Brancusi’s sculptures of simplified subjects, perfected and idealized, often convey the essence of things over their external appearance. From the 1920s to the 1940s, the theme of the bird in flight preoccupied him, with the artist concentrating on the animal’s movement, rather than its physical characteristics. Brancusi cast sixteen versions of Bird in Space in various sizes and media during his lifetime, two of which are in LACMA’s collection. In 1926, a U.S. Customs official refused to recognize a version of Bird in Space as art, which would have prevented it from being subject to import taxes. Brancusi brought a lawsuit in protest, and in 1928 the iconic sculpture became central to a landmark court decision determining that art need not be realistic, but could be abstract.

Wall label, 2021.
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Bibliography

  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Transformation: the LACMA Campaign. Los Angeles: Museum Associates, 2008.
  • Barron, Stephanie. Envisioning Modernism: The Janice and Henri Lazarof Collection. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Munich; New York: DelMonico Books-Prestel, 2012.