Jean Tinguely

Do-it-yourself-sculpture, 1961

In the 1950s, the Swiss artist Jean Tinguely, a member of the ‘Nouveaux Réalistes’ group in Paris, started to design reliefs, assemblages of found objects and useless machines. Parallel he was led by a growing interest in the combination of diverse elements and movement. White, geometrical shapes are applied to a square black ground in Tinguely’s Do-it-yourself-sculpture, 1961. The first association that occurs is a reference to Malevich’s Black Square. But a motor hidden behind the support can make the abstract signs turn noiselessly around their axis. The work of art is constantly redefined by the movement. This produces “endless series of combinations, encounters, partings, coming together again, constant change”. (Pierre Restany, 1959)