Sacrifice III

Jacques Lipchitz was born in Druskieniki, Lithuania, and immigrated to Paris in 1909 to pursue his interest in art. He studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian, and became friends with Cubist painters Pablo Picasso and Juan Gris. The influence of these important artists is evident in Lipchitz’s early sculptures of musicians, harlequins, and still lifes, created in a Cubist style. During the 1930s, his work became more symbolic, expressive, and highly personal, often relating to events in the artist’s own life. Though still abstract in form, his work moved toward more naturalistic, recognizable subjects, including scenes from mythology, biblical stories, and contemporary historical events such as World War II. In 1941, with little more than a portfolio of drawings in his possession, Lipchitz fled the Nazis and set up a studio in New York.

As a Jew, Lipchitz was drawn to subjects from the Old Testament. Also concerned about the fate of the Jewish people and pondering the birth of the new state of Israel in 1948, the artist began to explore the idea of sacrifice. Sacrifice III depicts a man wearing the ceremonial tallith (prayer shawl) while grasping a rooster around the throat with one large hand and thrusting the pronounced dagger into the rooster’s chest with the other. Modeled with a rough, nodular texture, the sculpture is comprised of voluminous, abstracted forms. The figure stands firmly, with his bare feet slightly apart and his stylized robe open to reveal his muscular body. Intensifying the dramatic moment, the rooster flails wildly–his beak open wide, wings extended, and talons attacking the figure. The lamb, traditionally a Christian rather than a Judaic symbol, peers quietly from between the man's legs and may represent the innocents who are saved and whose future will be secured as a result of the sacrifice.