Post by Elena Stroilescu

Constantin Brancusi Bird in Space 1928 Bronze 54 x 8 1/2 x 6 1/2" (137.2 x 21.6 x 16.5 cm) The Museum of Modern Art (NY) "Constantin Brancusi (1876-1957) sought to expand the bounds of sculptural language. At the core of this pursuit was an abiding interest in materiality, which he probed tirelessly across wood, bronze, and stone ... His forms—smooth, geometric, and evocative rather than descriptive—paralleled the broader emergence of abstraction in the early 20th century ... Though never formally aligned with movements such as Cubism or Surrealism, Brancusi was immersed in avant-garde circles, forging connections with artists and poets like Amedeo Modigliani, Fernand Léger, Guillaume Apollinaire, Marcel Duchamp, and Man Ray. Like the work of these peers, Brancusi's art engendered controversy. His now-iconic Bird in Space, which distills the motion of a bird in flight into a luminous and elongated arc, became the subject of a landmark legal battle. In October 1926, when a newly purchased version of the work was escorted to the United States by its owner Edward Steichen for an exhibition at the Brummer Gallery in New York and the Arts Club in Chicago, customs officials refused to classify it as art, declaring it “an object of manufacture.” They imposed on it the tariff for manufactured metal objects, or about 40% of the sale price. With the help of Duchamp and Steichen, Brancusi sued the US government and ultimately prevailed. Brancusi's radical interventions into form, space, and material became a touchstone for generations of artists. Observing that Brancusi had made sculpture 'once more shape-conscious,' Henry Moore proclaimed, 'Brancusi's work, apart from its individual value, has been of great historical importance in the development of contemporary sculpture'."  -- MoMA 🌑 Robert Galbraith (J.K. Rowling) The Hallmarked Man (novel, 2025) An ornate clock was set high on an archway to his left, a mechanical Saint George and the dragon above it, a legend in gold beneath it: 'No minute gone comes ever back again, Take heed and see ye do nothing in vain.'