Timeline

Sacha Sosno was born Alexandre Sosnowsky in Marseilles, France. He studied in Paris in politics, science, oriental languages, law and finally film at the film and cinema Institute at Rue D’Ulm. After studying he set up a magazine named Sud Communications with a group of friends and became involved in many different artistic fields including photography, printing and archaeology. Although Sacha began painting in 1948 when he was inspired by his neighbour Henri Matisse but he stopped in 1956 and burnt all of his abstract works when he met Yves Klein and became disillusioned by the potential message of artworks. From 1963 until 1966 he worked with the press alongside Jean Sainteny. Sosno becomes a columnist and photographer as a war correspondent based in Ireland and writes a book ‘Baifra: Proximity of Death, Continuity of Life’.

Between 1969-1973 Sosno became increasingly involved with sociological art movements and wrote and practiced on the potential of the art video. He also spent some time with Arman in New York. Sosno had an early contact and affinity with New Realism; a movement developed in Nice and where he knew many of its earliest members including Yves Klein and Arman. Between 1974 and 1977 he resumed his artistic practice in earnest, beginning sketches for sculptures during a around the world trip. In 1978 he had completed his first work in bronze in India. In 1983 Sosno had his first private exhibition at the Musee des Beaux-Arts in Nice.

Sosno’s work has been termed l’art d’oblitér or the ‘art of obliteration’ as a result of his idiosyncratic voids or solids added to an artwork, which obliterate or distort the full picture or figure. His pieces frequently display either the absence of material or an obstructing addition. For example in Tete aux quatre vents femme Sosno removes sections of the bronze work, leaving holes where the face, ears and back of the head ought to be. This requires the audience to use its imagination in constructing the full image.

In 1985 Sosno moved to New York and had his first solo exhibition at the Aldrich Museum in Connecticut. Between 1986 and 1988 Sosno develops a set of projects involving sculpture in architecture where he works alongside architects to produce works like the 26 meter high sculpture embedded in the walls of the Élysee Palace Hotel in Nice. This extends to the production of an inhabited sculpture produced in Cicago in 1991. In 2000 he begins to work on his seminal project of the ‘Square Head’ made for the Central Library Offices in Nice. In 2001 Sosno works on a series of obliterations based on props and objects found in theatre sets. In 2005 Sosno is invited to Beijing and commissioned to produce a monumental sculpture for the façade of the Chinese Academy of Fine Art in celebration of the 2008 Olympic Games. In 2006 this project was extended into a number of further commissions for a symposium for the Olympic games in China.

Sosno’s work has been exhibited widely and he has an international reputation. His work can be found in six museums worldwide. His passion for architecture and urban space has engaged him in many outdoor sculptures in which he believes architecture must be imbued with the artistic.