Christo

CHRISTO (Bulgaria, 1935- USA, 2020).
"The Arc de Triomphe de L'Etoile, Wrapped (place Charles de Gaulle Paris)".
Collage.
Signed and dated in the lower right corner. Signed and dated on the back.
Attached document signed by Christo in 2019.
Measurements: 28 x 22 cm; 29 x 23 cm (frame).

The tourist who in late September and early October 2021 would be lucky enough to stroll along the Arc de Triomphe in Paris would most likely be in for a shocking surprise: the iconic monument had been wrapped by Christo and Jeanne Claude with 25,000 square meters of silver-blue recyclable polypropylene fabric, and with 3,000 meters of red rope. The history of this project dates back to 1961 when, three years after meeting in Paris, Christo and Jeanne-Claude began creating works of art in public spaces. One of their projects was to wrap a public building. The Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation itself states "When he arrived in Paris, Christo rented a small room near the Arc de Triomphe and was drawn to the monument from then on. In 1962, he made a photomontage of the wrapped Arc de Triomphe as seen from Avenue Foch and, in 1988, a collage. 60 years later, the project was finally realized."
Christo and Jeanne Claude's "wrappings" have had a special impact on the history of contemporary art. This pair of conceptual artists conceived the idea of wrapping public monuments to generate the double game of giving visibility to something through the practice of hiding it: statues and emblematic buildings usually go unnoticed, so Christo, from the seventies on, planned to resignify them (leaving most of them only in projects, with plans, drawings, etc.) opting for a type of art that was at the same time grandiloquent and ephemeral.

A well-known artistic couple of the late 20th century, Christo and Jeanne-Claude's wrapped objects are some of the most extreme examples of conceptual art. Christo Valdimirov Javacheff studied between 1952 and 1956 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Sofia, then spent a year in Prague. In 1957 Christo fled the socialist state and settled in Vienna, from where he would travel to Geneva and finally to Paris. His life in Paris was characterized by economic deprivation and social isolation, which was increased by his difficulty in learning the French language. He earned money by painting portraits, which he likened to prostitution. In January 1958, Christo made his first piece of "wrapped art"; he covered an empty paint jar with a canvas soaked in acrylic. Christo and Jeanne-Claude met in Paris in November 1958. In 1961 he tackled what would be his first project with large objects, wrapping barrels in the port of Cologne. In 1962, Christo and Jeanne-Claude tackled their first monumental project, "Rideau de fer", as a statement against the Berlin Wall. The work consisted of blocking off Visconti Street over the river with oil barrels. Although Christo was simultaneously holding his first gallery exhibition, it was the Visconti project that made him known in Paris. In 1964 the couple settled in New York. In 1968 they participated in Documenta 4 in Kassel, and in 1969 they undertook one of their most famous projects, that of wrapping the Little Bay waterfront in Sydney, Australia. Since then, they have completed numerous large-scale projects around the world, including "Running fence" and "Wrapped walk ways" in the United States, "Pont Neuf" in Paris, "Umbrellas" in the United States and Japan, and the Reichstag building in Germany.