1947-1949

Black Flames

American (born France), 1911 - 2010

Although recognized as one of the most important artists of the late twentieth century, Louise Bourgeois spent over half of her career in relative obscurity. In 1938 she moved to New York City from France, and in the late 1940s she began making abstract wood sculptures such as Black Flames. These towers of wood, plaster, steel, and cast rubber—at the same time delicate and monolithic—unmoored traditional concepts of sculpture. Many of these early works, which the artist meant to display in groups, reference the human body and allude to the people in Bourgeois’s life.