Jean Arp

Lore & Background

Arp was born in Strasbourg to a French mother and German father during the period when Alsace–Lorraine was under German control. After World War I, when the region reverted to France, French law required him to adopt a French name, and he legally became Jean Arp, though he continued using 'Hans' when speaking German. He studied at the École des Arts et Métiers in Strasbourg, the Weimarer Kunstschule, and the Académie Julian in Paris. In 1911 he was a founder-member of the Moderne Bund in Lucerne, and in 1912 he exhibited with Der Blaue Reiter in Munich. In 1915 he moved to Switzerland to avoid German military service, feigning mental illness to evade the draft. That year he met Sophie Taeuber, who became his collaborator and wife in 1922. In 1916 he joined the Dada activities at Cabaret Voltaire in Zürich, and in 1920 he helped form the Cologne Dada group with Max Ernst and Alfred Grünwald.

Reader's Guide

Arp's significance lies in his pioneering role in Dada and abstract art, influencing the development of biomorphic forms and chance-based composition. He broke with Surrealism in 1931 to co-found Abstraction-Création, expanding his practice from collage and relief to bronze and stone sculpture. His work gained international recognition after a 1949 solo exhibition in New York, followed by a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in 1958 and another at the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris in 1962. He received numerous awards, including the Grand Prize for sculpture at the 1954 Venice Biennale and the 1965 Goethe Prize. His legacy is preserved by three foundations in Europe: the Fondation Arp in Clamart, the Fondazione Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach in Locarno, and the Stiftung Hans Arp und Sophie Taeuber-Arp e.V. in Berlin and Rolandseck. The Musée d'art moderne et contemporain of Strasbourg holds many of his works.

Did You Know?

• Arp pretended to be mentally ill to avoid being drafted into the German Army during World War I.
• He married Swiss artist Sophie Taeuber on 20 October 1922; she died in 1943 from accidental carbon monoxide poisoning.
• Arp legally changed his name from Hans to Jean when Alsace–Lorraine reverted to France after World War I.
• He was a founder-member of the first modern art alliance in Switzerland, the Moderne Bund, in 1911.

Notable Quotes (Wikiquote)

"In recent times, Surrealist painters have used descriptive illusionistic academic methods." — Jean Arp "Arp's critical quote refers to the creation of art by the French Surrealists in which Jean Arp participated for a few years and then departed." — Jean Arp "Quote of Jean Arp, referring to Swiss Dada in Zurich after 1914." — Jean Arp "As the thought comes to me to exorcise and transform this black with a white drawing, it has already become a surface..

.Now I have lost all fear, and begin to draw on the black surface." — Jean Arp