In the summer of 1947, Arman met and befriended Yves Klein. In April 1960 both signed Pierre Restany’s manifesto of Nouveau Réalisme, a French movement that, in response to the emerging consumer society, aimed at “a poetic recycling of urban, industrial and advertising reality,” which translated into the use of junk materials and urban detritus and new media such as assemblage, collage and experimental poster art. By that time, having abandoned painting, Arman started making works that consisted of household garbage contained inside boxes.