Strikingly vertical and pointed at both ends, Louise Bourgeois’s ‘Persistent Antagonism’ (1946-1948) is an extraordinary work from the artist’s landmark ‘Personage’ series, which marked her debut as a sculptor.

The ‘Personages’ served as physical surrogates for Bourgeois’s loved ones and convey the artist’s sense of psychological loss and mourning in the wake of her relocation to the United States from France. Bourgeois explained that the ‘antagonism’ expressed in this work arose from feelings of isolation and is symbolized by the eight finger-like forms dangling from the sculpture’s waist.

With ‘Persistent Antagonism,’ Bourgeois explored the physical and psychological possibilities of sculpture, drawing inspiration from the urban environment and personal experience. The sculpture’s elongated silhouette echoes the skyscrapers that surrounded Bourgeois’s home in New York, while simultaneously evoking a phallic, monumental totem.

An iconic work in Bourgeois’s oeuvre, ‘Persistent Antagonism’ was originally done in balsa wood before being cast in bronze. The original, now held in the collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, was exhibited in Bourgeois’s landmark shows at Peridot Gallery in New York in 1949 and 1950.