Jaume Plensa

by Jean-Louis Andral (Editor), Claire Lilley (Editor), Jean Frémon (Editor), Jaume Plensa (Artist)

Jaume Plensa (born 1955) is one of the major figures of contemporary sculpture, best known for his prodigious human figures constructed from stainless steel. Plensa is not only a sculptor, however, and this monograph explores an underappreciated facet of the Spanish artist’s oeuvre: his drawings. As they are not made to order and do not require the help of assistants, the drawings afford Plensa a greater freedom of experimentation. Plensa works with a variety of materials, such as plastic sheets or thick glue on paper or Plexiglas, modulating the interplay between light and transparency, which imbues his two-dimensional works with the appearance of volume. As with his sculptures, the artist focuses on the human figure, which he assembles with photos, letters and numbers. By elucidating the diversity of Plensa’s artistic process, the monograph champions his drawings as works in their own right.