Max Ernst
French, born Germany, 1891–1976
Human Figure with Two Birds
INV-9044
Max Ernst
French, born Germany, 1891–19761925/29
Human Figure with Two Birds
Max Ernst French, born Germany, 1891–1976 →paintingmodern and contemporary art
Date
1925/29
Medium
Oil on emery paper, mounted on scrap-wood panel covered with industrial-grade black paper
Dimensions
116.4 × 39.4 cm (45 7/8 × 15 1/2 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Through prior gift of the Albert Kunstadter Family Foundation
Like Constantin Brâncusi, Max Ernst was fascinated with birds, and among his earliest works incorporating this motif are some two dozen small, unconventional pictures made around 1925. One of these works was incorporated as a picture within a picture in Human Figure with Two Birds, a painting that set the stage for an extraordinary series of works that Ernst began in 1930, which featured a large, fantastic bird figure that the artist identified as Loplop. In these works, Loplop, the artist’s "private phantom attached to my person," generally holds up a picture for presentation. Here the rudimentary figure outlined in white is an early manifestation of Loplop, Ernst’s playful, surreal concept of self-portraiture by proxy.
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