Alexander Archipenko

Original Prints: Engravings, Drypoints

Best-known today for his key role in the development of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, Alexander Archipenko (1887 - 1964) first studied in his home town of Kyiv, then Moscow, and soon settled in Paris* in 1908, where he frequented La Ruche, and became a member of the renowned Section d'Or.  The three Duchamp-Villon brothers were quite instrumental in his subsequent evolution.

In this period of tumultuous artistic movements, Archipenko was also one of the most cosmopolitan: in 1913, he for example exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris, the hallmark Armory Show in New York, and the new Galerie Der Sturm in Berlin.  In 1921 he moved to Berlin, where he taught, and then emigrated definitively to the USA in 1923.

_________________________

*  The Paris years have long been considered crucial, as may be seen in an exhibition held at the MOMA, New York, in 1970, where a posthumous impression of our print was shown:
https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_2685_300327007.pdf

Kneeling [À Genoux] Karshan 4, only known state drypoint, circa 1920, a splendid proof impression printed in sanguine, on medium-heavy cream wove paper with full margins This print is one of his masterpieces in the genre, showing his research in formal simplification and the graphic  expression of movement.