The Golden Bird

• OSSIP ZADKINE
  The Golden Bird

• 98 x 20 x 23 cm
  Valentine Prax Bequest, 1981
• 1924
• Painted plaster and gold leaf gilding
• Inv. MZS 169
• Room 5

This plaster gilded with gold leaf (the gold leaves are applied with glue over a red mixture referred to as red bole) and painted matt black, was mounted by Zadkine on a wooden framework using oakum. This Golden Bird is in many respects comparable to certain works by Brancusi. It is also related to the aesthetics of the 1930s.
From the end the 1920s Zadkine was in contact with many interior designers and collaborated with some of them. Nicolas Marc Du Plantier acquired several of Zadkine's works at the beginning of the 1930s which were placed in the apartments he decorated. Amongst these works was the the Golden Bird plaster work, which today is found in the museum's collections.