Jacques Lipchitz

Jacques Lipchitz
Jacques Lipchitz, 1935, photograph Rogi André (Rozsa Klein)
Born	Chaim Jacob Lipschitz (1891-08-22)22 August 1891 Druskininkai, Lithuania
Died	16 May 1973(1973-05-16) (aged 81) Capri, Italy
Nationality	French American
Education	École des Beaux-Arts
Known for	sculpting
Movement	Cubism

Jacques Lipchitz (22 August [O.S. 10 August] 1891 – 16 May 1973) was a Cubist sculptor, from late 1914. Lipchitz retained highly figurative and legible components in his work leading up to 1915-16, after which naturalist and descriptive elements were muted, dominated by a synthetic style of Crystal Cubism. In 1920 Lipchitz held his first solo exhibition, at Léonce Rosenberg's Galerie L'Effort Moderne in Paris. He subsequently moved to New York City, where he worked on a number of projects, notably with the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania.

Jacques Lipchitz was born Chaim Jacob Lipschitz, in a Litvak family, son of a building contractor in Druskininkai, Lithuania, then within the Russian Empire. At first, under the influence of his father, he studied engineering, but soon after, supported by his mother he moved to Paris (1909) to study at the École des Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian.

It was there, in the artistic communities of Montmartre and Montparnasse, that he joined a group of artists that included Juan Gris and Pablo Picasso as well as where his friend, Amedeo Modigliani, painted Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz.

Living in this environment, Lipchitz soon began to create Cubist sculpture. In 1912 he exhibited at the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts and the Salon d'Automne with his first solo show held at Léonce Rosenberg's Galerie L'Effort Moderne in Paris in 1920. In 1922 he was commissioned by the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania to execute five bas-reliefs.