The poet - Zadkine

The Poet - Zadkine
Knokke
Ossip Zadkine (Belarus, 1890-1967)

Created: 1956
Installed: 1965
Purchased: 1963
Location: Albertplein, Het Zoute

About the artist
Zadkine, born in Smolensk, studied drawing and wood engraving at a very young age in England, and then settled in Paris, where he mingled with circles of Léger, Archipenko, and Marc Chagall. In the 1920s, he was inspired by Cubism, particularly in the fragmentation of bodies and an almost musical rhythm, but he fundamentally continued to work in an expressionistic style. He evolved with his larger bronze works towards a more open style, always balancing between the abstract and the classical, matter and feeling. After his stay in America during World War II, he exhibited works created there in Paris and Rotterdam; there he received the commission for his famous work "The Destroyed City." In 1950, he won the Sculpture Prize at the Venice Biennale and gradually became a celebrity, inundated with commissions. Zadkine passed away in Paris. In 1980, the Zadkine Museum was opened there, showcasing works he left to the city.

About the sculpture
Five copies of the bronze sculpture "The Poet" (or "The Writer") were cast, including one for New York. The sculpture sensitively expresses "the singer of freedom." The municipality of Knokke-Heist purchased the sculpture in connection with the Zadkine exhibition of 1963 at the Casino. It was inaugurated on September 4, 1965, in the presence of the sculptor. The Poet holds the lyre of Orpheus against his chest; it is an "unfinished" sculpture, a torn plant full of verses. The poem Liberté by Paul Éluard is incorporated into the sculpture.

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