I need to make things, she said.
The physical interaction with the medium has a curative effect.
I need the physical acting out.
Photo:Louise Bourgeois, Spider, 1996byThomas Hawk (photographer), Louise Bourgeois (artist)(CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)
I need to have these objects exist in relation to my body.
She never stopped creating, either.
She finished new work just weeks before her death at 98 years old.
Photo: Oliver Mark (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Read on to learn more about this pioneering female artist, including her most famous series.
Her life at home was marred with traumatic events.
Bourgeois mother, Josephine, was ill and her daughter would care for her over long periods.
Photo:Janus Fleuri (1968)byLeonard Chien (photographer)(CC BY-NC 4.0)
Josephine died when Bourgeois was 22.
Much of this was against the backdrop of World War I.
In 1930, Bourgeois began attending the Sorbonne to study mathematics and geometry.
Photo:Bilbao 22_000038byJoan (photographer)(CC BY-NC 4.0)
But with her mothers death, she decided to pursue art instead.
She took classes for free by translating for English-speaking students; translators werent charged.
During this time, Bourgeois continued to soak in art and became a docent at the Musee du Louvre.
She opened a gallery in 1938 and met American art professor Robert Goldwater while there.
They married and she moved to New York City with him.
She used materials like wood, plaster, and latex.
Bourgeois would return to sculpture sporadically throughout the 1950s and 1960s as she focused on psychoanalysis.
This inner work ultimately helped inform and develop her visual language and create pieces she never had before.
For Bourgeois, we can look to the humble spider as her iconic motif.
Like all of Bourgeois work, the spider is a symbol with a larger meaning.
The arachnid was a metaphor for her mother.
Its no surprise that the sculptures are titledMaman, or mom in French.
Mamanbegan to take form in the 1990s.
Bourgeois started by creating the creature as small steel sculptures.
In the 2000s, one edition ofMamanwas sculpted for the grand opening ofTate Modernin London.
This practice had a lasting impact on thecontemporary artworld.
