The Cube and the Face Georges Didi-Huberman The Cube and the Face Around a Sculpture by Alberto GiacOluetti Eclited by Mira Fliescher und Elena Vogman Translated by Shane B. Lillis diaphanes BM0696958 French Edition: Le cube et le visage. Autour d'une sculpture d'Alberto Giacometti © Editions Macula, Paris 1993 Published with the kind support of the French Ministry of Culture - Centre national du livre Ouvrage publie avec l'aide du Ministère français de la Culture Centre national du livre Published with funds of the Institute for Critical Theory (ith) of the Zurich University of the Arts Series THINK ART of the Institute for Critical Theory (ith) Zurich University ofthe Arts and the Centre for Arts and Cultural Theory (ZKK) University of Zurich AIl works by Alberto Giacometti: © Succession Alberto Giacometti (Fondation Alberto et Annette Giacometti, Paris + ADAGP, Paris) 2015 1St edition ISBN 978-3-03734-520-7 © diaphanes, Zurich-Berlin 2015 AIl rights reserved. No part ofthis publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Layout: 2edit, Zurich Printed in Germany www.diaphanes.com Contents Note 9 Buried Face 11 Face of the Orientation that Cannot Be Found 15 Face of the Drawing that Seeks its Volume 25 Face of the Cage and the Transparent Crystal 37 Face of the Bodies that COlIle Apart 43 Face of the Irrlpossible Dirnension 49 Face of the Dead Heads 63 Lost Face, Face of the Father 87 Face of Opacity and the Blind Crystal 103 Face of Shadow and Spacing 123 Melancholic Face 133 Face of the Drawing that Seeks its Notch 137 Face for Finishingwith the Object 147 Buried Face 157 Notes 199 Elena Vogman and Mira Fliescher In the Face of the Unface 225 Credits 247 Blank planes touch close sheer white aIl gone from mind. Little body ash grey locked rigid heart beating face to endlessness. [ ... ]. Four square true refuge long last four walls over backwards no sound. [ ... ] Little body little block heart beating ash grey only upright. Sarnuel Beckett, "Lessness".l Note An earlier version of these rernarks was conceived for the Giacornetti exhibition at the Musée d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, but it had to be reduced to the publication of a small sketch ("Sur les treize faces du Cube," inAlberto Giacometti, Sculptures, peintures, dessins, ed. Suzanne Pagé, Paris: Musée d'Art Inod erne de la Ville, 1991, p. 43-46). Beyond the opportunity created by this retrospective exhibition, and before that by a visit to the Kunsthaus in Zurich the following text owes a great deal to two recently published works aInong Inany other studies on Giaco InettÏ. The first is the collection of his own writings, published in French under the direction of M. Leiris and J. Dupin (Écrits, edited by Mary L. Pahner and François Chaussende); the sec ond is the monulllentallllonograph by Yves Bonnefoy entitled Alberto Giacometti. Biographie d'une œuvre. My own reInarks, as we shaH see, are in a constant dialogue with, or even a critique of, these two texts. The second was dis cussed orally, following the warm invitation of Yves Bonnefoy, at the Collège de France in Novelllber 1991. These pages also constitute a kind of test of certain pro positions froIn a work written in parallel, and entitled Ce que nous voyons, ce qui nous regarde, Paris, Minuit, 1992. Dominique Boudou, Pascal Convert, Christian Klemm, Rosalind Krauss, JaInes Lord and Margit Rowell all offered suggestions, infonna tion, or challenging questions. 1 wish to thank each oftheln very wannly. 9 Fig. 1: The Cube (1934), bronze, 94,00 x 54,00 x 59,00 cm. Kunsthaus Zurich (Alberto Giacometti Foundation), photographed by Denis Bernard. 10