César

César Baldaccini, known as "& nbsp; Caesar & nbsp;" is a sculptor and plastic artist born in Marseille in 1921. He first worked in his parents' bar before taking the courses of the School of Fine Arts in Marseille in 1935 then, in 1943, from the National School Fine Arts in Paris and occupies a workshop in an old brothel of the "& nbsp; rue de l'Échaudé & nbsp;". César meets Pablo Picasso and Germaine Richier then lives in the same house as Alberto Giacometti.Dès 1947, he works plaster and iron. In 1952, in Provence, he made his first tests of welds and his first scrap sculptures. Then was born the series of "& nbsp; irbs & nbsp;" and imaginary animals, made up of more than 300 constructions between 1949 and 1966. In 1960, the sculptor & Nbsp; discovered in a suburban scrap dealer a giant press of a new type, capable of instantly producing metal packages of one ton. The three car compressions executed according to this process, presented in Paris in 1960, are scandal. Subtile combination of choice and chance, the & nbsp; "ricard" compression & nbsp; belongs to the period of directed compressions, the formal aspect of which is determined by the loading mode of the press and by the selection of materials according to their qualities Plastics. Combination of an invitation to exhibit and the discovery of the pantographic enlargement process, the & nbsp; human imprints & nbsp; mark a turning point for Caesar which presents in 1965 its enlarged thumb then a bronze version 6 meters high, which has become iconic , in 1988 for the Seoul Olympics. In 1998, César died in Paris at the age of 77. Shortly before his death, the National Gallery of the Palume Game had devoted an important retrospective to him. His works are collected by museums and individuals around the world.