GERMAINE RICHIER | Le Combat

Private Collection, France

Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, 13 sculpteurs de Paris, 26 November - 1 February 1949 (other example)
Venice, XXVI Biennale internazionale d'arte, 1952 (other example)
Basel, Kunsthalle, Germaine Richier, Bissière, H.R Schiess, Vieira da Silva, Raoul Ubac, 17 June - 25 July 1954 (other example)
Minneapolis, Walker Art Center, Sculpture by Germaine Richier, 28 September - 9 November 1958; catalogue, no. 4 (other example)
Boston, University School of Fine and Applied Arts, Sculpture by Germaine Richier, 10 January - 7 February 1959; catalogue, no. 29 (other example)
Zurich, Kunsthaus, Germaine Richier, 12 June - 21 July 1963; catalogue, no. 50 (other example)
Arles, Musée Réattu, Germaine Richier, 7 July - 30 September 1964; catalogue, no. 17 (other example)
Saint-Paul-de-Vence, Fondation Maeght, Germaine Richier, Rétrospective, 5 April - 25 June 1996 ; catalogue, p. 61, no. 26, illustrated (other example)

René de Solier, L'oeuvre est un rendez-vous, exhibition catalogue, Galerie Maegth, Germaine Richier, 1948, no.13 (original plaster)
C.S.T, Germaine Richier, A Great Woman Sculptor, Harper's Bazaar, New York, 1953 no.2903, pp. 177-180, illustrated (other example)
André Chastel, Au musée d'Art moderne: "Germaine Richier : la puissance et le malaise", Le Monde, Paris, 1956 (other example)
Denys Chevalier, Sculpture encore: "Dans son atelier, vaste forêt de plâtres et de bronzes, Germaine Richier, chef d'école, sculpte les grands mythes sylvestres", Paris, 1956, pp. 81-83 (other example)
Georges Limbour, La vie des arts: Le pouce de Germaine Richier, France Observateur, Paris, 1956 (other example)
Radu Varia, Un poet tragic, Secolul 20, Bucarest, 1968, no. 3 (other example)

The colours in the printed catalogue illustration are fairly accurate.One of the connecting wires presents traces of oxidation. This work is in good condition.
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PLEASE PLACE ON LEFT PAGE FR VERISON: 

Même lorsqu’elle utilise les fils obliques, qui donnent à ses sculptures un aspect léger et arachnéen, Germaine Richier ne perd pas de vue une des notions fondamentales de la statuaire classique : l’importance de la base, l’ancrage au sol de ses figures. René du Solier l’avait pressenti : « Depuis l’Araignée, les fils [qu’introduit avec eux Richier] pourraient être, sans système, une protestation contre l’étirement et la verticalité. (...)»
Leur épaisseur et leurs irrégularités de surface mises à part, les bras des personnages de La Lutte sont comme une hypertrophie de ces fils qui divisent l’espace, tendus selon les mêmes angles obliques. L’œil court ainsi du crâne des duellistes au plan de leur ring, en une sorte de lutte inextricable qui englobe tout l’espace de la sculpture.
Moins complexe, Le Combat présente une différence sensible dans le traitement des fils. Si ceux qui séparent et relient les lutteurs sont lisses, les fils des combattants sont torsadés et ponctués de petites perles de bronze qui semblent marquer les emplacements successifs des poings des deux adversaires.
Le premier Sablier, qui date de la même année, étend ces principes. Les fils y sont simplement remplacés par des bras démesurés qui justifient le titre de l’œuvre [et introduisent] une joute d’un genre nouveau, plus amoureuse que belliqueuse, mélange d’attirance et de répulsion.



ENG VERSION

Even when she uses slanting wires, which give her sculptures a light and spider-like aspect, Germaine Richier does not lose sight of one of the fundamentals of classical sculpture: the importance of the base and anchoring her figures well into the ground. René du Solier had seen it coming: "Ever since l'Araignée, the wires (which Richier introduces and uses to introduce herself as well) can be seen as a protest against elongations and verticality. (...)" Their thickness and superficial irregularities aside, the arms of the characters of La Lutte are like a hypertrophy of these wires which divide up the space, stretched along the same oblique angles. The eye runs from the skulls of the duelists to the surface of the ring, in a sort of inextricable fight which covers the entire space created by the sculpture. 
A less complex example is Le Combat, which presents a sensible difference in the treatment of the wires. Those which separate and connect the fighters are smooth, while the ones between the opponents are twisted and punctuated by small bronze beads, as if to mark the consecutive places of where the characters' punches land.
The first Sablier, which dates back to the same year, extends the same principles. The wires are simply replaced by extravagant arms, which justify the title of the work [and introduce] a new type of fight, more romantic than it is warlike, a mix of attraction and repulsion. 

Jean-Louis Prat, Germaine Richier, catalogue de la rétrospective à la Fondation Maeght, 1996