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Lot Essay
Self-portrait with a Strange Machine is the only self-portrait Paolozzi made in sculpture. In 1987 the London and Paris Property Group commissioned a major Paolozzi sculpture for the exterior of their new building at 34-36 High Holborn, stipulating that it should consist of a portrait of the sculptor. For his likeness, Paolozzi adapted a portrait bust of himself made by the sculptor Celia Scott, which had been commissioned several years before by the architectural and postmodernist historian Charles Jencks, for the 'Winter' room of his themed London house. The Scott portrait bust represented Paolozzi as Vulcan, the Roman god of winter, the home and hearth, and his Greek incarnation as Hephaestus, son of Zeus, the god of fire, who made elaborate works in gold, siver and bronze. The double life-size bronze figure The Artist as Hephaestus was installed at High Holborn in December 1987. The pose of Self-portrait with a Strange Machine, which is the same as that of The Artist as Hephaestus, is awkward as befits the lame god, standing one foot in front of the other like an ancient Greek 'Kouros'. The round disc he holds, an echo of the marvellous five-layered shield Hephaestus made for Achilles, is shown as a strange surrealist machine which, appropriately in Paolozzi's version, was sourced from the used part of a washing machine.
As a stage in the creative process of the Holborn figure, Paolozzi made two smaller than life-size self-portraits in bronze, Portrait of the Artist as Vulcan and Self-portrait with a Strange Machine, which were shown at the Royal Academy in 1987; the second was bought by the National Portrait Gallery. The exhibition 'Paolozzi Portraits' at the National Portrait Gallery in May 1988 showed these and related sculptures, including the first versions of Newton, which was later commissioned on a monumental scale by the architect Sir Colin St. John Wilson for the courtyard of the new British Library. The catalogue of the National Portrait Gallery exhibition discusses the subject and significance of the self-portrait and its relationship with Paolozzi's other work.
The unique bronze Self-portrait with a Strange Machine, a private commission, was cast at the Arch Bronze Foundry, Putney, in 1988. It differs from other versions of the subject, in patina, the arrangement of the held objects, the base, and other details, which will be enumerated in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of Paolozzi's sculpture.
We are very grateful to Robin Spencer, author of the forthcoming Paolozzi catalogue raisonné, for providing the catalogue entries for lots 156-158.
As a stage in the creative process of the Holborn figure, Paolozzi made two smaller than life-size self-portraits in bronze, Portrait of the Artist as Vulcan and Self-portrait with a Strange Machine, which were shown at the Royal Academy in 1987; the second was bought by the National Portrait Gallery. The exhibition 'Paolozzi Portraits' at the National Portrait Gallery in May 1988 showed these and related sculptures, including the first versions of Newton, which was later commissioned on a monumental scale by the architect Sir Colin St. John Wilson for the courtyard of the new British Library. The catalogue of the National Portrait Gallery exhibition discusses the subject and significance of the self-portrait and its relationship with Paolozzi's other work.
The unique bronze Self-portrait with a Strange Machine, a private commission, was cast at the Arch Bronze Foundry, Putney, in 1988. It differs from other versions of the subject, in patina, the arrangement of the held objects, the base, and other details, which will be enumerated in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of Paolozzi's sculpture.
We are very grateful to Robin Spencer, author of the forthcoming Paolozzi catalogue raisonné, for providing the catalogue entries for lots 156-158.