Sheep (Moutons)
By Francois-Xavier Lalanne
Category: Sculpture
About
The sheep in Sheep (Moutons) are actually usable as garden benches. Other works are similarly functional: he has made donkeys as desks, gorillas as safes, baboons as wood stoves, and so on. Each work is technically sound and yet poetically thoughtful. He considers himself an “artisan” in the medieval sense of the term. Lalanne delights in his works and insists that his objects have an everyday usefulness so that they can be enjoyed readily by others.
Dimensions: variable
Year Completed: 1993-1998
Material: Cast epoxy, stone and bronze
Owner: Missouri Botanical Garden
About the artist:
Francois-Xavier Lalanne
b. 1924
Francois-Xavier Lalanne is the last man in the world to bother his head with the “new scene” in art as it is presented by the art magazines. He and his wife and collaborator Claudia like to see their work put to use, preferably in a domestic situation rather than roped off in a museum. If there are frontiers between art and decoration or art and utility, the Lalannes have not heard of them. All of Lalanne’s work is fun and functional on some level and much of the work is designed with the garden in mind.
