Sale: 401 / Post War/Contemporary Art, Dec. 08. 2012 in Munich Lot 340

 

340
Sigmar Polke
Vollmond im Widder, 2004.
Silkscreen in colors
Estimate:
€ 30,000 / $ 32,400
Sold:
€ 34,160 / $ 36,892

(incl. surcharge)
Vollmond im Widder. 2004.
The portfolio comprising 40 Silkscreen in colors with offset lithographs as well as title leaf and imprint. Published by mike karstens graphics, Münster 2004.
Each signed and numbered. Numbered in imprint. Each with printed edition note on verso. From an edition of 40 copies. On firm wove paper by Somerset (without watermark). Each ca. 27,5 x 21 cm (10,8 x 8,2 in). Sheet: each ca. 43,8 x 34,8 cm (17,2 x 13,7 in).
Printed by mike karstens graphics, Münster (each with blindstamp). The complete set. With original board case. The drawings from the magazine "Registro", made on Sardinia and in Geneva in 1971, served as model for these 40 sheets. Loose sheets mounted on backing board and framed.

Born in Oels, Silesia, in 1941, Sigmar Polke moved in 1953 from Thuringia to Düsseldorf, where he embarked on an apprenticeship as a glass-painter in 1959. He spent the years 1961-1967 studying at the Düsseldorf Art Academy under Gerhard Hoehme and Karl Otto Götz and met with Gerhard Richter. In 1963 Polke and Richter joined forces with Konrad Fischer-Lueg and Manfred Kuttner to mount an exhibition entitled 'Eine Demonstration für den kapitalistischen Realismus' ['A Demonstration for Capitalist Realism']. The exhibits were notable for the ironical treatment of consumer product and the critical use made of everyday clichés. Wit and irony are the hallmarks of Polke's work, even in its early stages, most noticeably so when he stagily features socks, sausages or interchangeable advertising from travel brochures. The first grid and strip pictures as well as paintings on decorating fabrics emerged. In 1966 the artist was awarded the Young Art Prize and had his first one-man show. During the 1970s he travelled extensively, concentrating heavily on photography as a medium. Both in it and in painting his work often has an experimental flavour, with coincidence figuring prominently and autonomous chemical processes having discernibly taken place. In 1972 Polke showed work for the first time at a documenta. In 1977 he became an instructor and in 1991 a professor at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg. He regularly shows work at exhibitions in Germany and abroad and the largest retrospective of his work to date took place in 1997 at the Federal Art and Exhibition Hall in Bonn and at the Galerie der Gegenwart, Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin.

In the early works by Polke, humor and irony show as common features of his art, for instance when he uses socks, cut-outs from travel brochures or sausages as artistic means. Towards the end of the 1960s, in a still early period of creation, he made the portfolio "..Höhere Wesen befehlen"' (Higher beings command) in which he explores the "Möglichkeitsformen der Palme" (Subjunctives of the palm tree) as a form of textbook with 14 ironic photos. The portfolio 'Vollmond im Widder'', from 2004, a late period of creation, is completely different. Polke seems to have reached the roots of artistic expression. He put subtly drawings over intensive color surfaces, which, in terms of motif, reference the works of other artists.

The renewal of the glass windows in the Zurich Grossmünster ("great minster") was his biggest commission, which he received in 2006 in context of an artist competition. The five glass and seven agate windows were completed November 2009. Polke died on 10 June,i 2010. [KH/AS].




340
Sigmar Polke
Vollmond im Widder, 2004.
Silkscreen in colors
Estimate:
€ 30,000 / $ 32,400
Sold:
€ 34,160 / $ 36,892

(incl. surcharge)