Zadkine Research Center

This website is a window on the work of the Zadkine Research Center which is dedicated to the life and oeuvre of the Russian sculptor/artist Ossip Zadkine (1888–1967).

It provides an account of the discoveries we have made over many exciting years of investigation. Whether concerning so far unidentified or lost artworks, or sharing new information about his life, we will endeavour to lift the veil on many of our studies to further stimulate the interest that there has always been around Zadkine’s works.

We invite you to register your artworks (sculpture, gouache, drawing) in our database, to help us to add to our ever-growing archives, and we offer you our expertise.

 

About Ossip Zadkine

Ossip Zadkine was a relentless, unclassifiable and prolific artist. We can today count more than 612 sculptures and a large number of works on paper, 765 gouaches and drawings as well as 200 lithographs and etchings. The exhibition of his works in his Parisian studio of the rue Rousselet on May 20th 1920, marks the beginning of a long series of shows, including more than 105 solo exhibitions during his lifetime, in Europe but also in the United States and in Japan.

Zadkine lived in Belarus (in Vitebsk, his birthplace), in England (Sunderland and London), in France (Paris, Bruniquel, Les Arques), during the First World War he enlisted voluntarily and was posted to the Russian ambulance corps in Champagne in 1916 and during the Second World War he fled to New York (October 1941 – September 1945). He also travelled to many places: Belgium, the Netherlands, Greece, Italy, Japan, America, amongst others. Zadkine collaborated with many people on diverse occasions, with architects (Adrien Blomme, Joseph André, Hugh Maaskant), decorators (Marc du Plantier, André Groult), poets (Claude Aveline, Robert Ganzo, Pierre Béarn …) and was close to important individuals, artists (Marc ChagallHenry MooreTsuguharu FoujitaAmedeo Modigliani …), thinkers, founders, collectors and doctors, industrialists, businessmen… worldwide. He gathered together his memoirs in “Le Maillet et le Ciseau” which he started writing in 1962.

All of these elements are starting points that sometimes open up on new directions and allow us to solve certain questions, occasionally prompting us to take surprising, unsuspected and often captivating paths.

 

Help us identify & register your Zadkine works – info@zadkine.com