Pierre Restany
- Critic
Collaborated with · 1955–1962
Klein met Restany at his 1955 monochrome exhibition in Paris. Restany wrote for later exhibitions, named the Anthropometries, and worked with Klein in founding New Realism.
- Painter
- Sculptor
Yves Klein
French artist who made the monochrome, empty gallery, body print, fire, and pure pigment into central materials of postwar art during a brief Paris career.
In images
Details
- 1928–1962
- 28 April 1928
- Nice, France
- 6 June 1962
- Paris, France
- French
- Painter, sculptor, performance artist, and judo practitioner
- International Klein Blue monochromes, The Void (1958), Anthropometries (1960), Leap into the Void (1960)
- Rotraut Uecker
- PainterSculptor
About Yves Klein
Judo, mysticism, and the monochrome
Yves Klein pursued judo and painting in parallel. After the French Judo Federation refused to recognize the qualification he had earned in Japan, he opened his own school in Paris and decorated it with monochromes. His reading in Rosicrucian mysticism also shaped the spiritual meaning he assigned to color and immaterial space.
A Paris career begins
Klein showed monochromes at the Club des Solitaires in Paris in 1955. There he met the critic Pierre Restany, who wrote for subsequent exhibitions and worked with Klein throughout the artist's career. The meeting gave Klein an advocate able to place his experiments within a broader account of postwar art.
He concentrated on an intense ultramarine that became known as International Klein Blue. At Galerie Iris Clert in 1958, The Void presented an emptied, white gallery as the work. In 1960 his Anthropometries used models coated in blue pigment to leave direct impressions of their bodies on paper.
New Realism and the final years
Klein, Restany, Arman, and other artists signed the declaration of New Realism in 1960. Klein continued separately with fire paintings, gold leaf, pink pigment, and works that treated air and absence as artistic material.
He died in Paris in June 1962 after a series of heart attacks. He was thirty-four. The compressed career left a vocabulary that later performance, conceptual, and installation artists continued to use.
Life events
Born in Nice.
Shows monochromes at the Club des Solitaires in Paris and meets Pierre Restany.
Begins the blue period associated with International Klein Blue.
Presents The Void at Galerie Iris Clert in Paris.
Signs the founding declaration of New Realism and develops the Anthropometries and fire paintings.
Klein with Wall of Fire in January 1961, extending the immaterial art of his Paris performances into flame. Dies in Paris at age thirty-four.
People they knew
Arman
- Sculptor
- Painter
Collaborated with · 1947–1962
Klein and Arman were childhood friends in Nice and later became fellow signatories of Pierre Restany's founding declaration of New Realism.
Jean Tinguely
- Sculptor
Collaborated with · 1958–1962
Klein and Tinguely exhibited and experimented together in Paris before both signed the 1960 founding declaration of New Realism.
Sourced claims
Collaborated with · 1955–1962
Pierre Restany
Klein met Restany at his 1955 monochrome exhibition in Paris. Restany wrote for later exhibitions, named the Anthropometries, and worked with Klein in founding New Realism.
Collaborated with · 1947–1962
Arman
Klein and Arman were childhood friends in Nice and later became fellow signatories of Pierre Restany's founding declaration of New Realism.
Collaborated with · 1958–1962
Jean Tinguely
Klein and Tinguely exhibited and experimented together in Paris before both signed the 1960 founding declaration of New Realism.
References
References
The sources below include biographies, scholarly essays, interviews, and primary materials that informed this page. They reflect both the historical record and ongoing critical conversations about Yves Klein and their work.
1Yves Klein: the artist and his work
WebsiteCentre PompidouUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Yves Klein page.
2New Realism
WebsiteCentre PompidouUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Yves Klein page.
3Yves Klein
WebsiteThe Museum of Modern ArtUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Yves Klein page.
4Yves Klein
WebsiteSolomon R. Guggenheim MuseumUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Yves Klein page.
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Why these sources are here
These references anchor the page in the documented record and in the scholarly conversations around Yves Klein. Every claim on this page traces back to one or more of the works listed here.
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