

Naum Gabo Russian, 1890-1977
Including base: 57.7 x 31.5 x 20.5 cm
Gabo made stone sculpture over some 37 years and the Catalogue Raisonné lists twenty-one small stone sculptures and models and a further 18 larger stone sculptures.
It was not in the form of fossils or seeds or any other natural object that Gabo discovered his forms, his inspiration came from his experiences of abstract events in nature.
Colour was important to Gabo when he searched for blue marble. The stone he found was carved into Blue Marble. It was based on a small carving, a plaster model and a drawing that are now in the Tate; the idea dates from his time in Europe. In the top of the small plaster there is a hole where Gabo explored adding another element. That idea was rejected when he took it up again, he made more drawings and a full-scale plaster maquette, also in the Tate.
Provenance
The Artist
Estate of Naum Gabo
Annely Juda Fine Art, London
Exhibitions
Modernist Pioneers
20 May - 31 July 2021: Annely Juda Fine Art, London
Gabo’s Stones
30 October – 17 December 2014: Annely Juda Fine Art, London
Catalogue no.7, illustrated in colour
Literature
Ed. Steven A. Nash and Jorn Merkert, Naum Gabo: Sixty Years of Constructivism, Including
Catalogue Raisonne of the Constructions and Sculptures, Prestel-Verlag, 1985, no. 76.4, page 253