Artist Christo who wrapped Reichstag in fabric dies aged 84

AFP/File / Niklas HALLE'NChristo made transforming internationally known landmarks his speciality

The artist known as Christo, who made his name transforming landmarks such as Germany's Reichstag by covering them with reams of cloth, died on Sunday aged 84, his official Facebook page announced.

Christo Vladimirov Javacheff died of natural causes at his home in New York City, the statement said.

The Bulgarian-born artist worked in collaboration with his wife of 51 years Jeanne-Claude until her death in 2009.

Their large-scale productions would take years of preparation and were costly to erect; but they were mostly ephemeral, coming down after just weeks or months.

"Christo lived his life to the fullest, not only dreaming up what seemed impossible but realising it," said a statement from his office.

"Christo and Jeanne-Claude's artwork brought people together in shared experiences across the globe, and their work lives on in our hearts and memories."

In accordance with Christo's wishes, the statement added, a work in progress, "l'Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped", would be completed.

The event is now scheduled to be shown from September 18, 2021, having been postponed from this year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Born on June 13, 1935 in Gabrovo, Bulgaria, Christo left his home country in 1957, living briefly in several countries before arriving in Paris, where he met his future wife, a fellow artist.

But in their subsequent collaborations, he was credited more as the artist and Jeanne-Claude as the organiser.

"This is not the work of Christo, it's the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude," she would say.

To finance their massive, ambitious projects and thus maintain their artistic freedom, the couple would sell their preparatory work, including collages and drawings, at exorbitant prices.

- An 'enchanter' -

Next year's work in Paris will be accompanied by an exhibition at the city's Pompidou Centre about their time in the city. That show is due to start in July this year, running until the end of October 2020.

A statement sent to AFP by the Pompidou Centre on Sunday paid tribute to the artist as an "enchanter" who was "essential to the history of art of our time".

"Christo was a great artist, capable of giving new depth to our everyday," said the Pompidou Centre's president, Serge Lasvignes.

AFP / Pierre GUILLAUDHis 1985 project covering Paris's oldest bridge, the Pont Neuf, is one of his most famous works

The centre's director, Bernard Blistene, said they had worked "passionately" with Christo's team to put the exhibition together in parallel with the Arc de Triomphe project.

"Let the exhibition that we will be opening on July 1 pay tribute to this exceptional body of work, bestriding all disciplines and so essential to the history of art of our time," he added.

The exhibition will focus on the time Christo and his wife spent in Paris, 1958 to 1964, during which they developed their signature style.

As well as the German Reichstag, another of their major projects was wrapping the Pont Neuf, Paris's oldest bridge, in 1985.

Sunday's statement from Christo's office concluded: "In a 1958 letter Christo wrote, 'Beauty, science and art will always triumph'. We hold those words closely today."

Christo, master of the monumental wrap-up

AFP/File / Niklas HALLE'NBulgarian-born Christo insisted on the ephemeral nature of his work, even though they took years of planning

From Paris's oldest bridge to Berlin's Reichstag, Bulgarian-born US artist Christo spent decades wrapping landmarks and creating improbable structures around the world.

Christo, who died on Sunday in New York at the age of 84, collaborated with his wife of 51 years, Jeanne-Claude, until her death in 2009. Afterwards, he continued to produce dramatic pieces into his 80s.

Their large-scale productions would take years of preparation and were costly to erect: but they were mostly ephemeral, coming down after just weeks or months.

"Totally useless," said Christo of their work in the 2019 documentary, "Walking on Water".

"Art is all about pleasure. Visual pleasure is very important — very invigorating, very engaging," he told The New York Times in 2016.

Gaunt, bespectacled, his long hair becoming wispy and white in age, Christo had been planning to cover Paris' Arc de Triomphe in silvery-blue recyclable material in 2021 to coincide with a retrospective at the city's Pompidou Centre.

The statement from his office Sunday announcing his death said that, in accordance with his wishes, that project would go ahead and was on schedule for September next year.

- Bulgarian fugue, Paris romance -

Born in 1935 in Gabrovo, Bulgaria, Christo Vladimiroff Javacheff fled the communist regime in 1956 aboard a goods train.

Arriving in Paris, he mixed with artists such as Yves Klein and Niki de Saint-Phalle, and dabbled in abstract painting.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude - 2019 Christo/AFP / Andre GROSSMANNChristo's final project, 'L'Arc de Triomph, Wrapped' is due to go ahead as planned despite his death, in accordance with his wishes

He met Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon in 1958, as he was doing a portrait of her mother, and they married the same year.

Their work was collaborative but they at first called themselves just Christo, creating the impression that their production was his alone.

Their son Cyril was born in 1960 and the family moved to the United States in 1964, Christo obtaining US nationality in 1973.

- The art of covering up -

Their first large-scale public installation appeared in 1968 when the couple wrapped Swiss art museum the Kunsthalle, in Berne, in 2,430 square metres (26,160 square feet) of fabric.

Among the most famous of similar works across the world were the Pont Neuf in Paris which was entirely draped in silky sandstone material in 1985, and 10 years later Germany's Reichstag covered in silvery shimmering fabric.

AFP / Pierre GUILLAUDAn earlier Paris project, in 1985, focussed on the city's oldest bridge, the Pont Neuf

There have been islands surrounded in floating pink material, an Australian beach covered in white, and a 39-kilometre-long (24-mile) cloth fence through the Californian hills.

The cost of these temporary installations can be astronomical.

"The Umbrellas" in 1991, for example, cost $26 million, entirely financed by the artists, according to their website. The simultaneous installation in California and Japan of hundreds of giant blue and yellow umbrellas was dismantled after 18 days.

Christo never accepted sponsorship, funding the projects through the sale of his sketches, collages, scale models and original lithographs.

- Fleeting and free -

The installations also required permits that could take lengthy negotiations to secure. Over 50 years, just 22 had been achieved by 2011 with 37 not receiving official permission, according to the website.

Some of the work has been controversial: the Reichstag wrap-up required a vote by German deputies, getting 292 in favour and 223 against.

AFP / NIKLAS HALLE'NOne of Christo's last projects was 'The Mastaba' on the Serpentine lake in Hyde Park in London: more than 7,000 coloured, horizontally stacked barrels on a floating platform

But the uncertainty and intense collaboration required each time were all welcome parts of the adventure.

"I think it would be absolutely boring to work the way many artists do," Christo said in The New York Times in 2014.

The temporary quality of the productions was also important to the artist.

When asked by Berlin authorities to prolong the Reichstag cover-up beyond its 14 days, Christo refused.

"It is a kind of naivete and arrogance to think that this thing stays forever, for eternity," he said in an interview with the Journal of Contemporary Art in 1991.

"All these projects have this strong dimension of missing, of self-effacement... they will go away, like our childhood, our life.

"They create a tremendous intensity when they are there for a few days."