Christo JAVACHEFF dit CHRISTO (1935 2020) - Lot 132

Christo JAVACHEFF dit CHRISTO (1935 2020) Packaging surface, 1961 Mixed media, painting on partially crumpled paper pasted on panel, signed and dated 61 lower right 58.5 x 25 cm 75 x 27.5 cm overall (Restorations (restored in June 2024), a few stains, a small accident) Provenance: - Gift from the artist to the current owner (given to the artist's mother for the current owner before she was born). birth). Exhibition: - Exhibition of the KWY group, Librairie-Galerie Le Soleil dans la tête, Paris, May 1961 We would like to thank the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation archives for informing us that this work is listed in their archives. work is listed in their archives. The KWY art group, active in the 1960s, was a collective founded by several artists, including Christo and other mostly Portuguese creators who had settled in Paris. The group's name, composed of the letters K, W, Y, chosen because they do not exist in the Portuguese alphabet, symbolizes a desire to break with tradition and open up to the international. Christo, alongside artists such as René Bertholo, Lourdes Castro, António Costa Pinheiro, Gonçalo Duarte, José Escada, João Vieira and Jan Voss, was a key member of KWY. Together, they launched an eponymous magazine, KWY, published between 1958 and 1963. This magazine was a veritable experimental laboratory for Christo, where he could explore and develop his innovative ideas in visual art, while participating in intellectual exchanges around poetry and reflection on contemporary art. KWY quickly became a point of convergence for various artistic currents, such as Art informel and Nouveau Réalisme. Expert : Cabinet Sevestre-Barbé De Louvencourt