Pierrot with Clarinet

Pierrot, a sad clown, is one of the most recognizable characters in the Italian commedia dell'arte. This ancient popular theatrical entertainment underwent a revival in Europe between the end of the nineteenth century and the 1930s. The commedia dell'arte is a common subject of Cubist art and appears in Lipchitz's work in 1919, when he modeled several different figures with either a clarinet or an accordion. Pierrot's costume—his distinctive hat, ruffled collar, a loose jacket with large buttons, and pantaloons—and musical instrument provided Lipchitz with a complex figurative motif to model in three-dimensional abstraction. Lipchitz generally began with clay or plaster studies, but some sculptures, like this one, he carved in stone. It is one of seven in an edition of bronzes. However, most of the early works were not cast in bronze until the 1950s, when Lipchitz lived in the United States.