NIKI DE SAINT PHALLE (1930-2002) “Remember?” Serigraph

Serigraph by French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle (1930-2002) is titled “Remember?” and depicts various moments of intimacy with a couple paired with whimsical colorful figures. Noted for her experimental style of making art that incorporated whimsical, light-hearted elements, Saint Phalle presents an image of charged eroticism meant to explore the passions she held for her lover. Housed in a modest silver frame, this serigraph is signed by the artist at the right hand corner of the print in faded ink.

About the Artist:
Catherine Marie-Agnès Fal de Saint Phalle was born in 1930 near Paris to a French father and an American mother as the second of five children. She spent most of her childhood in New York City, and summers in Connecticut or Long Island, though she frequently returned to France to visit relatives, becoming fluent in both French and English. Working as a fashion model in her late teens, Saint Phalle appeared on the cover of Life Magazine and in the pages of Elle and Harper’s Bazaar, and eloped with Henry Matthews, an author and childhood friend, at the age of 18. While Matthews studied music at Harvard University, Saint Phalle began to explore painting, being encouraged to paint as a form of therapy. At the end of the 1950s, Saint Phalle and her husband moved back to Paris. In 1960, however, the couple separated and Saint Phalle moved to a new apartment, established a studio, and met artist Jean Tinguely, with whom she would collaborate artistically. Within a year, they had moved in together and begun a romantic relationship. Saint Phalle became part of the Nouveau Réalisme movement along with Tinguely, Yves Klein, Arman and others, being the only woman in the group. Her most famous and prolific series of works, the Nanas, were begun in the mid-1960s and were inspired by a friend’s pregnancy, her reflections on archetypal feminine forms, and the vexed positions that women occupy in modern, patriarchal societies. ‘Nanas,’ a French slang word roughly equivalent to ‘broads,’ is a title that encapsulates the theme of the everywoman as well as the casual denigration that closely accompanies the rhetorical grouping of women as a social category. Saint Phalle became one of the first artists to get involved with the AIDS crisis, with the 1980s also serving as the the most prolific period in the Nanas series. Working at her art until the very end, Saint Phalle died in La Jolla, California in May of 2002 and has been immortalized as an artist that has had a significant effect on the development of conceptual art and feminism.

This serigraph is amongst hundreds of pieces of art that are available at our location in Grandview! Come in today and see the full collection.