The present lot has been authenticated by the Fondation Alberto et Annette Giacometti and is registered in the Alberto Giacometti Database, the online catalogue of authentic works by the artist, as number AGD 3477.

The ‘Star’ standard lamp was designed by Alberto Giacometti in 1936, one of over fifty of his decorative collaborations with Jean-Michel Frank. The artist and designer had a close personal relationship that would prove professionally beneficial to them during the interwar years. Their shared aesthetic language and intuitive understanding of the relationship of parts to a whole resulted in some of the finest interiors, furniture and lighting of the period. Frank was perhaps one of the first designers of the twentieth century to compose spaces meant to serve as a backdrop to carefully considered displays of avante-garde artwork, and Giacometti’s lamps and tables acted as the three-dimensional mediators between Frank's client’s art collections and his austere furnishings. Giacometti’s decorative works have thus taken on an iconic status as objects found in the most historically significant interiors and collections of the twentieth century. Giacometti’s designs for Frank allowed the sculptor the security to pursue his fine art practice and arguably influenced his perspective during the 1930s, a transitional period in his career. In part due to the financial rewards of this arrangement, Giacometti would come to view his decorative works as equally important to his sculptures.