Les Lalanne: Zoophites: From the Collection of Caroline Hamisky Lalanne
Curated by Paul B. Franklin

Kasmin is thrilled to announce Les Lalanne: Zoophites, an exhibition in homage to the acclaimed French sculptors Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne, drawn entirely from the collection of their eldest daughter, Caroline Hamisky Lalanne. The exhibition will include major works by these inventive artists who consistently defied art-world conventions. To celebrate the 60th anniversary of Les Lalanne’s first joint solo exhibition, which opened in Paris in June 1964, this exhibition borrows the title Zoophites, an obsolete French term for invertebrate animals that resemble plants in their appearance or growth patterns. The exhibition will be accompanied by a newly commissioned text by curator Paul B. Franklin.

A major highlight of the exhibition will be François-Xavier’s Grand Chat polymorphe (1998/2008), combining a rotating cat’s head with a fish’s tail, a bird’s wings, and a female pig’s belly and hooves, and opening to reveal a functioning bar cart. Based on a 1968 brass commission for the French architect Émile Aillaud and his wife, Charlotte, this work is one of only five realized in a large-scale bronze edition conceived in 1998. Its polymorphic structure makes explicit the inspiration François-Xavier drew from the fantastical creatures of ancient mythologies, recalling his upbringing studying classical literature, including Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and his work as a guard in the Egyptian and Assyrian galleries of the Louvre in 1949–50.

Another highlight of the exhibition will be Grand Rhinocéros V (1994/2000), a unique large-scale bronze sculpture of a rhinoceros, one of François-Xavier’s most important motifs. “The rhinoceros remained central to his artistic output,” according to Kathleen M. Morris, curator of Les Lalanne’s recent solo exhibition at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in 2021. Following the critical success of his first rhinoceros sculpture, which opened into a functioning desk and was featured in the 1964 exhibition Zoophites, François-Xavier created several large-scale rhinoceroses over the course of his career, found today in major collections, including the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. With a shimmering black patina, Grand Rhinocéros V is the sole example executed from a 1994 design, which originally was conceived as an edition of 8. Its geometric and abstract forms are indicative of the artist’s inimitable style.