Painted wood
The title of this sculpture identifies its two spherical shapes as navels and the larger, upturned form as a bell. The navel was one of Arp's signature motifs, as he considered its associations with birth, growth, and procreation to be particularly resonant. In his work it can resemble an egg, a seed, a womb, and as paired here, breasts—or the orb of the earth itself. As Arp explained, "It's the first thing that exists, the beginning." He connected human life not only with the cycles of nature, but also with the act of artistic creation. The year he made this work Arp declared, "Art is a fruit that grows in man like a fruit on a plant or a child in its mother's womb."
The Erotic Object: Surrealist Sculpture from the Collection, June 24, 2009–January 4, 2010.
Provenance Research Project
This work is included in the Provenance Research Project, which investigates the ownership history of works in MoMA's collection.
1931 - 1966, Jean (Hans) Arp, Meudon-Val-Fleury, Seine et Oise, France.
1966 - 1968, Estate of Jean Arp (Marguerite Hagenbach Arp), Clamart, France, and Locarno-Solduno, Switzerland.
1968, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, purchased from Marguerite Hagenbach Arp through Sidney Janis Gallery, New York.
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A Surreal Lens
Gallery 517In 1924, André Breton published his Manifesto of Surrealism, which, guided by Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theories, declared a radical break from the rationalism of modern society in favor of imagination, erotic desire, and unconscious thought.
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