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Maman
Giant spider strikes again!.jpg
Artist Louise Bourgeois
Year 1999 (1999)
Type Sculpture
Medium Stainless steel, bronze, marble
Dimensions 9271 x 8915 x 10236 mm


Maman (1999) is a bronze, stainless steel, and marble sculpture in several locations by the artist Louise Bourgeois. The sculpture, which depicts a spider, is among the world's largest, measuring over 30 ft high and over 33 ft wide (927 x 891 x 1024 cm). It includes a sac containing 32 marble eggs and its abdomen and thorax are made of rubbed bronze.

The title is the familiar French word for Mother (akin to Mummy or Mommy). The sculpture was created in 1999 by Bourgeois as a part of her inaugural commission of The Unilever Series (2000), in the Turbine Hall at London's Tate Modern. This original was created in steel, with an edition of six subsequent castings in bronze.

Bourgeois chose the Modern Art Foundry to cast the sculpture because of its reputation and work.

Philosophy and meaning

Bürkliplatz - Louise Bourgeois' 'Maman' - Alpenquai 2011-07-26 17-36-24
Sac containing marble eggs
At Zürichsee-Schifffahrtsgesellschaft, Zürich, 2011
Spider ^ - geograph.org.uk - 1140529
The original 1999 stainless steel Spider at the Tate Modern in 2009

The sculpture picks up the theme of the arachnid that Bourgeois had first contemplated in a small ink and charcoal drawing in 1947, continuing with her 1996 sculpture Spider. It alludes to the strength of Bourgeois' mother with metaphors of spinning, weaving, nurture and protection. Her mother, Josephine, was a woman who repaired tapestries in her father's textile restoration workshop in Paris. When Bourgeois was twenty-one, she lost her mother to an unknown illness. A few days after her mother's passing, in front of her father (who did not seem to take his daughter's despair seriously), Louise threw herself into the Bièvre River; he swam to her rescue.

The Spider is an ode to my mother. She was my best friend. Like a spider, my mother was a weaver. My family was in the business of tapestry restoration, and my mother was in charge of the workshop. Like spiders, my mother was very clever. Spiders are friendly presences that eat mosquitoes. We know that mosquitoes spread diseases and are therefore unwanted. So, spiders are helpful and protective, just like my mother.

Permanent locations

  • Tate Modern, UK – The permanent acquisition of this sculpture in 2008 is considered one of the Tate Modern's historical moments. Maman was first exhibited in the Turbine Hall and later displayed outside the gallery in 2000. It was received with mixed reactions of amazement and amusement. The sculpture owned by the Tate Modern is the only one made from stainless steel.
  • National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Canada – The National Gallery of Canada acquired the sculpture in 2005 for 3.2 million dollars. The price took around a third of the annual budget of the gallery.
  • Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain
  • Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan – On display at the base of Mori Tower, outside the museum.
  • Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, United States
  • Qatar National Convention Center, Doha, Qatar

Temporary locations

Tours and featured exhibitions of Maman include:

  • 2011: Fundacion Proa, Buenos Aires, Argentina
  • 2011: Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM), São Paulo, Brasil
  • 2011: Bundesplatz, Bern, Switzerland, 24 May – 7 June
  • 2011 Bürkliplatz, Zürich, Switzerland, 10 June – 2 August
  • 2011 Place Neuve, Geneva, Switzerland, 3 August – 28 August
  • 2011-2012 Beyeler Foundation, Riehen/Basel, Switzerland, 3 September 2011 – 8 January 2012
  • 2012 Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany, 23 January – 17 June
  • 2012 Qatar National Convention Centre, Qatar – The Maman sculpture; exhibited from 20 January – 1 June, at the Qatar National Convention Centre as the centerpiece of the Conscious and Unconscious exhibition; the first solo exhibit of Bourgeois' work to be displayed in the Middle East. The exhibit was organised by the Qatar Museums Authority.
  • 2012-2013 Roppongi Hills, Tokyo, Japan
  • 2014 Qatar National Convention Centre, Ad-Dawhah, Qatar, February
  • 2013-2014 Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, Mexico, 15 November 2013 – 2 March 2014
  • 2015 Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden, January 2015 – 17 May
  • 2015 Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow, Russia, 25 September – 7 February
  • 2020 Museum Voorlinden, The Hague, the Netherlands, until 17 May
  • 2020-2021 Fundação de Serralves, Porto, Portugal, December 2020 - February 2021
  • 2022 Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center, Athens, Greece, 30 March - 6 November
  • 2023 Palace Park in Oslo, Norway, 24 April - August
  • 2023-2024 Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, 25 November 2023 - 28 April 2024

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Mamá (escultura) para niños

  • Cultural depictions of spiders
  • List of artworks by Louise Bourgeois
  • Spider (Bourgeois)
  • Featured in Denis Villeneuve's 2013 film, Enemy.

Gallery

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