Brancusi - Mlle Pogány

• This sculpture is a portrait of Margit Pogány, a Hungarian artist who sat for Brancusi several times in 1910 and 1911 while she was in Paris studying painting
• Shortly after her return to Hungary, Brancusi carved a marble Mlle Pogány from memory, then made a plaster mould of the work, from which he cast four additional versions, including this one, in bronze. In representing its subject through highly stylized and simplified forms, the work was a significant departure from conventional portraiture
• Large almond-shaped eyes overwhelm the oval face, and a black patina represents the hair that covers the top of the head and extends over the elaborate chignon at the nape of the neck. As with other motifs, this was a subject Brancusi would return to and rework in the years to come.
• Style:

  the Art Nouveau style prominent at the time is also discernible in this portrait bust of Margit Pogány.
• The egg was a pure and essential form for Brancusi, especially in more dense stone like marble – it was the core, the kernel of the medium.
• The ‘egg’ shaped head: this takes on its ovoid shape by virtue of the mechanical forces which operate during its growth, gestation and delivery. (Humans first start as an egg, we should pay virtue to that).