Opera Gallery Geneva, is pleased to present an exceptional exhibition with over 40 rare sculptures and paintings by Alexander Calder and Jean Dubuffet, from September 24 – October 10, 2015. This exhibition entitled Between Sky and Earth, explores the complementarity between the works of these two giants of the 20th century.

These two artists are from the same generation but never met. Alexander Calder was American and Jean Dubufet was French. Both have lived their artists’ lives travelling from one continent to the other. Both have been, at the beginning of their respective carriers considered as “outsiders” in their own country but their talent was immediately acknowledged in France for Calder and in America for Dubuffet.

Both have revolutionized conventional art by an audacious use of informal techniques and materials. They explored new possibilities of creation, cleared of all cultural constraints. Calder makes sculpture “move” and uses wire, cork, wood or steel; Dubuffet paints by blending sand, soil, papier-mâché and even Brillo-pad. Constantly floating between abstraction and figuration, between two and three dimensions, neither of them really joined a specific artistic movement. Both staged and gave life to their work, Calder with the Calder’s Circus (miniature animated circus with ingeniously articulated wild animals and acrobats) and Dubuffet with Coucou Bazar (sort of ballet performance with sculptures and paintings of his Hourloupe cycle).

As Calder is captivated by the stars and the Universe, he maintains: “The underlying sense of my work has been the system of the Universe, or part thereof. For that is a rather large model to work from”; Dubuffet finds his inspiration in the functioning and malfunction of the human being, his habitat, and in the mineral, vegetal and organic world. He expresses himself: “Look at what lies at your feet! A crack in the ground, sparkling gravel, a tuft of grass, some crushed debris, offer equally worthy subjects for your applause and admiration.”

Calder – Dubuffet, an exhibition between Sky and Earth not to be missed.