Jean Clareboudt

Jean Clareboudt was born in Lyon in 1944 and died in 1997. 

Jean Clareboudt conceived sculptures that were entirely connected to the places where they were created or exhibited. Rather than altering these sites, his works offered new ways of approaching and perceiving them. The idea of movement and displacement is central to Clareboudt’s work. His numerous journeys around the world reflected an insatiable curiosity that continually led him to seek out new forms and compositions, each enriched by the natural and social contexts he encountered. 

At Atelier Calder, Clareboudt worked on his Passages series (1991–92), monumental spheres made of raw metal and composed of two perforated discs connected to one another at their centers. These sculptures stood as witnesses to the natural environments that surround them. The energy emanating from these works comes largely from the raw metal itself, which preserves traces of the gestures involved in their making.