[Zurab Tsereteli] Sculpture “Birth of the New Man”

Technique: Bronze.

Zurab Tsereteli Sculpture “Birth of the New Man”. Russia, author Z. Tsereteli. Late 1990s – early 2000s. Bronze, casting. Height with stand 21 cm. On the base, cast inscription: “©1992 Z. Tsereteli”. This sculpture by Zurab Tsereteli, President of the Russian Academy of Arts, is a reduced copy of the monument located in the Spanish city of Seville. The sculptural group “Birth of the New Man” was unveiled in 1995 in the presence of the King of Spain and became the first stage of the large-scale project “How Europe Found America”, dedicated to the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's historic voyage to the shores of the American continent. In 1994 the UNESCO commission on culture named the monument “Birth of the New Man” the best work of sculpture of the 20th century. The concept of the monument was based on the legend of Columbus's egg. According to legend, when Christopher Columbus was telling of his discovery of America at a dinner given by Cardinal Mendoza, one of the cardinal's guests exclaimed: “Why, it is so simple!” Columbus then invited him to solve a seemingly equally simple task – to stand an egg upright on the table. However hard he tried, he could not do it. Columbus, tapping the blunt end of the egg on the table, flattened the shell at the base and stood the egg on the table, after which he said: “Yes, it really is very simple”. This story became the key to the sculptural image, whose composition combined both the shape of an egg and the shape of sails. Inside the egg-dome formed by the sails and yards stands the admiral with a map in his hand. The sails bear Maltese crosses and the names of the three caravels – “Santa María”, “Pinta” and “Niña” – on which Columbus set out on his expedition and which brought him worldwide fame as a discoverer. Zurab Konstantinovich Tsereteli (b. 1934) – sculptor, painter, graphic artist. He graduated from the painting faculty of the Tbilisi Academy of Arts and worked at the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnography of the Academy of Sciences of Georgia. In 1964 he studied in France, where he associated with the outstanding artists Pablo Picasso and Marc Chagall. From the late 1960s he began to work actively in the field of monumental art. From 1997 – President of the RAKh. Besides Russia, the master's sculptural works are located in Brazil, Great Britain, Spain, the USA, France, Japan and Lithuania.