Armand Fernandez was born in 1928 in Nice. Together with Klein, Tinguely, Raysse and César, Arman is one of the most important artists of the Nouveau Réalisme.
His acquaintance with Yves Klein led to the idea of organising joint happenings and events, which the two artists realized in 1953. Arman's neo-dadaist 'Cachets' of 1955, and later the 'Allures' and the 'Coupés' followed by the were greatly influenced by Kurt Schwitters. When the last letter of his name was accidentally forgotten on a catalogue cover in 1958, he decided to keep this spelling as a pseudonym: Arman.
The artist discovered his famous 'Poubelles', plexiglas cases with rubbish cast in resin, at the beginning of the 1960s. From the 'Poubelles' Arman developed the so-called 'Accumulations', series of similar objects assembled in show cases. These arrangements consisted mainly of day-to-day-life objects, with which the artist ironically questioned the waste character of modern mass products.