Meret Oppenheim; Surreal Sculptor

BERN, Switzerland — Meret Oppenheim, noted Swiss sculptor and a stalwart of the surrealist movement, died Friday, friends announced. She was 72.

She was born in Berlin to a Swiss mother and German father and grew up in Switzerland. She studied art in Paris, where Max Ernst, the German-born surrealist painter, was among her friends.

She had joint exhibitions in Paris with Joan Miro, Salvador Dali and Rene Magritte. In 1936, she created an international stir with her “Fur-Lined Breakfast Cup,” which was later purchased by New York’s Museum of Modern Art.

The painting is of a cup and saucer covered with fur and, said Los Angeles Times art critic William Wilson, is widely used as an example of what surrealism is.

After her return to Switzerland in 1937, she pursued her artistic career in many fields, including a contribution to an exhibition of surrealist furniture.

She also was one of the early “actionist” artists, serving friends a meal on a woman’s nude body in 1959. Her international awards included the 1972 Art Prize of the City of Berlin.

The cause of her death was not immediately known.