Claude Lalanne

b. Paris, France, 1925 ; d. Ury, France, 10 April 2019

Claude Lalanne’s pieces are mainly created by making molds, casting, and electroplating. This method, which she discovered through American artist James Metcalf in 1956, is employed by metal smiths, using electrolysis to coat objects in a thin layer of metal. Claude Lalanne captures natural forms and instinctively turns them into sculptures, tables, benches, or mirrors. She has a natural sensibility for the ornamental and baroque styles, and keeps this free from her self-imposed technical constraints: “What matters is the shape and what it conveys to me.”

After an initial exhibition at Galerie J in Paris in 1964,  Lalanne's sculptures were displayed at Alexandre Iolas' galleries in Paris, New York, Milan, Geneva, and Athens from 1965 to 1979. Their affiliation with the Galerie Mitterrand began in the early 1990s. A retrospective on their career was held in 2010 at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and in the Petit Trianon at the Château de Versailles in 2021.