"Fågeldemonen"
Signed with monogram EG and numbered 3/3. The motif originally conceived in 1946. Bronze, dark patina, height 89.5 cm. Cast in 2001 by Skånska Konstgjuteriet, Hannas.
Literature
Gunnar Eklöf et al. "En bok om Eric Grate 1963, compare pp. 39–40, 45.
Ragnar von Holten et al., "Eric Grate. Skulptur," 1990, compare p. 19.
Ragnar von Holten, "Surrealismen i svensk konst," SAK, 1969, compare p. 49.
More information
In the summer of 1945, Eric Grate was commissioned by director Alf Sjöberg to create the set designs and costumes for the Swedish Royal Dramatic Theatre's production of Jean-Paul Sartre's "The Flies." The play is a modern, existentialist interpretation of the Greek myth of Orestes, who returns to his hometown of Argos to avenge the murder of his father, Agamemnon.
The assignment suited Grate particularly well given his familiarity with ancient Greek art and, after a long stay in France, with French culture. He was able to draw on these experiences when creating the play's universe through set design and costume.
The idea of the transformative form between humans and the insect-like flies and creatures became significant for Grate's imagination after 1945. Following the costume sketches for "The Flies," Grate developed sculptures in bronze, including "Flugornas försångare" (The Precursor of the Flies) (1945) and the sculpture presented in this auction, "Fågeldemonen" (The Bird Demon) (1946).
More about Eric Grate
Eric Grates idiosyncratic world of images always invites exploration and wandering within the imagination. While he respects the the earths natural forms, he sometimes "plays with god", manipulating and playing with nature to create new surprising objects which we recognise but simultaneously dont recall. He borrows fragments from nature and uses his endless imagination to create art in his unique way. His visual language emualtes an aura of abstract surrealism derived from "object trouvés". Grate was inspired by natures radiance and its different forms. Stones, roots, insects, bones, all were transformed into sculptures, particularly the insect world was a source of great inspiration for Grates. During the 1960s, beach, hull, and bones were particularly the starting points for his sculptures. He created numerous official artworks.
Grate began his academic trips after finishing his studies at Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts from 1979-20, where he travelled to Italy and Greece, filling his sketchbooks with studies of insects, plants, unique architecture, sculpture, and ceramics. He spent a longer period between 1924 and 1933 in Paris, a formative period where he was one of the few Swedish artists who was associated with the avante garde; we got in contact with none other than the surrealists Jean Arp, Paul Eluard, and Tristan Tzara. Grate is seen by many as one of Sweden's most influential sculptors during the 1900s.
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