Blind Man's Buff

From the museum

Wit and play are essential elements throughout Louise Bourgeois’s work. Blind Man’s Buff is named for the child’s game in which a blindfolded person must search for fellow players using only sound and touch. The artist’s revision of “bluff” to “buff” has a dual meaning. It evokes the method of smoothing or buffing marble, which was part of the artwork’s production. Buff also relates to the sculpture’s suggestion of nude body parts, which emerge from the solid marble. The allusion to nudity is reinforced by the fabric folds visible at the sculpture’s edges, as if clothing has been cast aside. Historians have made connections between the bulging, rounded forms in Blind Man's Buff and representations of Artemis of Ephesus, the goddess of fertility in Greek mythology, and the Venus of Willendorf, one of the earliest ancient art objects discovered.

The museum’s own description, in English. Licence: CC0