Christian Boltanski (French, b.1944) is a self-taught French sculptor and photographer, best known for his elaborate installations of found objects. He began painting in 1958, and, in 1960, became known for his short films and notebook publications. Later, he began using clay, sugar, and gauze to create objects for his series Attempt at Reconstitution of Objects that Belonged to Christian Boltanski between 1948 and 1954. His whole body of work has dealt with notions of death and the ephemeral as experienced through loss and memory.
Boltanski’s work has been exhibited at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, among other institutions. His work is currently held in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Tate in London, and the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris. He currently lives and works in Paris.