Miguel Berrocal
opus 98 - David
Miguel Berrocal
| opus 98 - David | 1966
Opus 98 David year created in dimensions elements caracteristics
1966 CrĂŠspieres-France + Verona - Italy . 31 x 17.5 x 9 cm 23 Disassemblable
edition
1 exemplar in forged iron, welded and patinated 2 exemplars in stainless steel / Shaw Process (1/9 to 2/9) 7 exemplars in sanded bronze and patinated (3/9 to 9/9)
Miguel Berrocal opus 098 - David - Assembly instructions Like all disassemblable sculpture, each element is an abstract sculpture in itself and at each step of the assembly process, you have another sculpture
| opus 98 - David | 1966
Miguel Berrocal
| opus 98 - David | 1966
Opus 098 - David
History of a Piece
The Opus 098 - David is one of the most important sculptures in the whole corpus of the works by Berrocal. There are four main reasons for which this sculpture must be considered a milestone in his production: the creation year - 1966 - the two chosen themes of the Torso and of “David�, as well as the fact that this sculpture is the first of a long lineage of other important works. 1966 - an important year David comes in one of the most important years for Berrocal, when he decides to move from his StudioHouse in Crespieres, outside of Paris, to Verona,
Italy, where he will finally live most of his live. In spite of this time consuming endeavor, 1966 is also one of the most prolific years for Berrocal, who managed to also create at the same time other milestones of his career such as the opus 096 - Cariatide, opus 097 - Adamo Secundus, that with 41 elements was his most complex sculpture until then and is the 4th most complex ever, and started developing the opus 101 - Romeo and Juliet, his second multiple but the first to be produced in 2000 exemplars with industrial molds and mass manufacturing techniques. Through both the theme, a male torso, and the
name, David, Berrocal intentionally plays with classical Archetypes, adopting them both as an inspiration and a tool for his work. The Torsos Berrocal had admired the beauty of the Greco Roman statues when, almost a decade earlier he had won a scholarship to visit Rome and Italy. Although these sculptures have been mutilated by time, they represented for the artist a quite contemporary abstraction on the theme of the human figure: the Torso is in itself an a abstract part of the body, a synecdoche, a part that can represent the whole; the Torso is
Miguel Berrocal
the essence of a body, as much as the disassembly that allows to look inside the sculpture is Berrocal’s research of the essence of form and it’s inner hidden structures. The title: David The title of the work of course evokes the David of Michelangelo, and refers even more so to the famous Biblical character, who although smaller than his opponent Goliath, managed to defeat him thanks to his wits. The story of David becomes therefore a double metaphor: on one side is an indirect reference that you must exert your cognitive functions to solve the puzzle of the forms; secondly, and most importantly, it alludes to the fact that although small in size the disassembly of this sculpture is still a monumental victory. In fact one of Berrocal’s most famous philosophical ideas was that “The concept of Monumentality is not necessarily tied to size”. David - the ancestor of an important family Lastly, the opus 98 - David, must be considered a very important milestone in Berrocal’s corpus of work, because it is the first of a family of similarly titled torsos, the opus 107 - Mini David, and the opus 120 bis - MicroDavid, that will become the most famous pieces of Berrocal: the Mini David, edited in 10.000 exemplars almost all sold, is the quintessence of the ideas of the “Multiple” and of the more contemporary “Art Toy”, while the MicroDavid jewel-sculpture, with an intended edition of 1 million exemplars, is by far the biggest edition ever by any artist. Although similar in the outside shapes, the three works have very different inner structures, but you can sense that all the ideas had been started in the opus 98 - David.
Berrocal’s hand assembling parts of the opus 098 - David.
Opus 098 - David - Axonometry The axonometric technical drawing reveals the inner complexity of the work. Berrocal calld this view the 4th Dimension.
| opus 98 - David | 1966
Miguel Berrocal
| opus 098 - David | 1966
Opus 98 - David
Related Works
The opus 098 - David is the First Torso with horizontal disassembly. There are two more works that belong to this family of torsos: the opus 107 - Mini David and opus 120 bis - Micro David, each with dimensions progressively smaller but with a completely different inner structure and hence disassembly process.
Watching the horizontal and vertical sections of the three works is easy to notice that, in spite of the fact that the external shape is certainly very similar, the three Davids have very different inner structural solutions. This is one of the main features of Berrocal’s Art: it invites the viewer to look beyond the surface, to penetrate the form and see that there is more than meets the eye.
As for size, the Micro David reaches the limit of the smallest possible dimensions, becoming a small jewel or necklace.
Opus 098 - David vertical seection
Opus 107 - Mini David horizontal and vertical sections
Opus 120 bix - MicroDavid horizontal and vertical seection
Both the Mini David and the Micro David include a ring as one of their elements.
Miguel Berrocal
| opus 107 - Mini David | 1969
Opus 107 Mini David year created in dimensions elements caracteristics
1969 Negrar, Verona - Italy . 14 x 5 x 3.7 cm 23 Interlocking and disassemblable
edition
1 exemplar in alpacca and welded bronze. 6 exemplars in solid gold/ lost wax (I/VI to VI/VI), 500 exemplars in gold plated Zamak (1 to 500) Édition Soleil Noir, 9.500 in nickel plated Zamak (501 to 10.000)/ steel injection moulds.
notes
One of the ements is a ring. A book accompanies the edited sculptures, in which its disassembly is illustrated and commented. It is also certificate of authenticity. The version in gold plated Zamak locks with a key element that prevents disassembly, it is contained in a display box conceived by Berrocal for the mini- sculptures that contains: the instructions book, the elements of the disassembled sculpture, a rotating mechanism that allows the assembled sculpture to be seen from any angle and the book by Claude Pélieu “Ce que dit la Bouche d’ombre dans le bronze-étoile d’une tête” (illustrated by Miguel Berrocal, 1969), Édition Le Soleil Noir. Two exemplars of the gold plated Mini David by Berrocal, Édition Soleil Noir are in the collection of the MOMA The Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Miguel Berrocal
| opus 120 bis - MicroDavid | 1981-82
Opus 120 bis MicroDavid year created in dimensions elements caracteristics
1981-82 Negrar, Verona - Italy . 7 x 2.3 x 1.4 cm 18 Interlocking and disassemblable
edition
5.000 exemplars in gold (1 to 5.000), 10.000 exemplars in Sterling silver (5.001 to 15.000), 985.000 in berillium bronze, stainless steel, nickel plated Zamak and pewter. All exemplars casted by lost wax, except the ones in pewter casted by centrifugation
notes
One of the ements is a ring. A book accompanies the edited sculptures, in which its disassembly is illustrated and commented. It is also certificate of authenticity. The sculpture may be inserted in an optional stand in steel
Miguel Berrocal
| Miguel Berrocal: biography | 1933-2006
MIGUEL BERROCAL: short biography Miguel Ortﾃｭz Berrocal was born in Villanueva de Algaidas, Mﾃ｡laga, on September28, 1933. He began his academic training in the Faculty of Exact Sciences in Madrid, where he read the first two years of mathematics as a requirement for enrolment in the School of Architecture. Meanwhile, like many others who aspired to study architecture, he attended the School of Arts and Crafts, where he was taught by ﾃ］gel Ferrant, and later he studied with the potter Pierre Canivet in Paris. He took an early interest in sculpture that could be taken apart, transformed or combined, and this has remained a feature of all his subsequent sculptural output. In his sculpture there is a constant search for new concepts and unknown areas within the very structure of the work, creating a path by which the viewer can enter the world of construction and deconstruction. His work has been influenced by sculptors such as Oteiza and Chillida, among others. He uses classical themes (torsos, heads or reclining figures) and, above all, a certain anthropomorphism to avoid an excessively geometrical, abstract result, although in his work there is a clear imprint of mathematics and architecture, resulting from his own inclination or his academic training. His style is characterised by a Hellenic inspiration, a baroque quality, and a complexity and breadth of forms. The meticulousness and precision in the construction of complex manipulable pieces and the exactness of the drawings and subsequent assemblages result in sculptural elements that in turn consist of other pieces with an identity of their own. It was precisely the difficulty involved in the creation of each individual sculpture that in 1962 led him to embark on serial production. This provided the sculptor with a way of multiplying his pieces, just as painters do by means of graphic arts procedures. Thus a given theme may be repeated in a different dimension, with the combination of new elements or arranged in a different way. In 1974 his style underwent a remarkable reduction, and he began to make simpler, forms. In his most recent period he has used increasingly elemental, essential drawing. His first solo show was at the Xagra gallery in Madrid in 1952. Since then he has presented numerous exhibitions throughout the world, and his work is to be found in leading museums and institutions in Europe and America, establishing Berrocal as one of the most significant and important artists of our times.
Miguel Berrocal lived and worked in Negrar, Verona Italy between 1964 and 2005 when he decided to return to his born town in Andalucia Villanueva de Algaidas to build and open a new studio. He dies in Antequera, Mﾃ｡laga on May 31.2006 en plena actividad creativa.
Miguel Berrocal
| Fundación Escultor Berrocal para las Artes | 2007
Foundation Sculptor Berrocal for the Arts [Fundación Escultor Berrocal para las Artes]
The Fundacion Escultor Berrocal para las Artes (Foundation Sculptor Berrocal for the Arts) was established in 2007 to protect and enhance the vast creative legacy of the spanish sculptor Miguel Berrocal. The Foundation has been created by the heirs of Miguel Berrocal, fulfilling so his express desires and completing the project that the artist started while still alive. The Institution aims at the conservation, research and diffusion of Miguel Berrocal’s works, as well as the contribution to the development and progress of Culture and Arts, Science and Technology in all its forms. It achieves it’s objectives through exhibitions worldwide, promoting cross-disciplinary research and development in the fields of Arts, Sciences, Technology, Design and Education. for information
berrocal.net fundacion@berrocal.net
Aerial view of Villanueva de Algaidas, Málaga, Spain, birth town of Miguel Berrocal and location of the Berrocal Museum-System, a 3 place exhibition venue around Berrocal’s Creative Universe
Miguel Berrocal
| Main Public Collections | 1933-2006
Miguel Berrocal
Main Public Collections
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York
Musées Royaux des Beaux Arts de Belgique, Bruxelles
Auditorio de la musica de la Cartuja, Sevilla
Musées Royaux des Beaux Arts de Belgique, Bruxelles
Ayuntamiento de Huelva
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid
Ayuntamiento de Madrid
Museum Boymans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam
Ayuntamiento de Málaga, Málaga
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Ayuntamiento de Oviedo, Asturias
Museum Ludwig, Köln
Ayuntamiento de Villaneuva de Algaidas, Málaga
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Ayuntamiento de Zaragoza
Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin
Beelden aan Zee Museum, Scheveningen
Oficina de Turismo Español, Roma
Fonds Cantonal de Décoration et d’Art Visuel, Genève
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
Camera di Commercio di Carrara, Carrara
Rathaus, Ulm
Fundación Juan March, Madrid
Sprengel Museum, Hannover
Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Roma
Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Stuttgart
Hamburger Kunstahalle, Hamburg
Stadtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim
Hirshborn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.
Univeristy of Michigan- Museum of Art, Ann Arbor
International Sculpture Museum, Olympic Park, Séoul
Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Israel Museum, Jerusalem Jewish Museum, New York Mairie de Noisy-Le-Grand, Marne-la-Vallée Musée d’Art Moderne de St-Etienne, St-Etienne Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris Musée des Beaux-Arts, La Chaux-de-Fonds Musée Olympique, Lausanne
Miguel Berrocal
| Awards | 1933- 2006
Miguel Berrocal
Awards
1955
Medaille de bronze de la “Première Biennale di Alexandrie – Pays de la
1988
Goodwill Ambassador, UNESCO, Paris
Méditerranée
1989
Académico correspondiente de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid
1966
Grand Prix de Sculpture de la Biennale de Paris
1967
Medaglia d’oro del VII° Concorso Internazionale del Bronzetto, Padova
1990
Accademico dell’Accademia Nazionale di San Luca, Roma
1968
Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française
1993
Medalla de Oro de Andalucía, Sevilla
1969
Medaglia d’oro della Presidenza della Repubblica Italiana per “Il
1994
Academico de Honor de la Réal Academia de Bellas Artes Santa Isabel de Hungría, Sevilla
metallo come pura espressione d’arte” Va Biennale d’Arte del Metallo,Gubbio 1970 1973
Gran Premio de Honor da Biennal de Saõ Paolo.
1976
Accademico associato dell’Accademia Tiberina di Roma
1977
Medaglia d’Oro della XXXIIIaMostra Internazionale dell’ Arredamento-M.I.A., Monza
1981
Cambio 16, X° Aniversário, “Figura de la Decada” ,Madrid
1984
ABC de Oro del periodico ABC, Madrid
1985
Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française. Medalla de Honor “ VictorioMacho” de la Asiciación de Escultores y Artistas Españoles. Medalla de Honor “ VictorioMacho” de la Asiciación de Escultores y Artistas Españoles. Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana Academico numerario de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes Santa Isabel de Hungría, Sevilla
Scientific Council, International Institute for Opera and Poetry. UNESCO,Verona
Medalla de oro del Ateneo de Mälaga Corona d’onore dell’ International Aesthetic Research, Torino
1987
2000 2002
Cruz de Plata, Agrupación Española de Fomento Europeo, Barcelona