Sale: 461 / Post War I, Dec. 09. 2017 in Munich Lot 816

 

816
Yves Klein
Monochrome bleu (IKB 242 A), Um 1958/59.
Mixed media
Estimate:
€ 150,000 / $ 162,000
Sold:
€ 187,500 / $ 202,500

(incl. surcharge)
Monochrome bleu (IKB 242 A). Um 1958 /59.
Mixed media . Blue pigment and synthetic resin n paper.
Not in Wember any longer. Verso signed by Rotraut Klein-Moquay as well as with a dated inscription "Dieses Bild ist ein / Original von Yves Klein / Köln den 29. August 1986 (This is an original picture by Yves Klein)". Once more signed by the artist's widow and inscribed with the work number "IKB242 A". On firm paper. 21.5 x 18.1 cm (8.4 x 7.1 in) , the full sheet.

Yves Klein's monochrome blue canvasses and paper works are among the artist's internationally most sought-after works.
The work is registered at the Yves Klein Archive, Paris. We are grateful to the archive for the kind support in cataloging this lot.

PROVENANCE: Galerie Bischofsberger, Zurich.
Collection Helmut Dudé.
Sotheby’s Amsterdam, The Helmut Dudé Collection, May28, 2003, lot 49.
Collection van Hulten, Netherlands.

EXHIBITION: Zero und Paris. 1960 und Heute, Galerie der Stadt, Villa Merkel, Esslingen 1997, p. 74, with illu.
Zero International, Musée d’Art Moderne et d’Art Contemporain, Nice 1998
A Collector’s Eye. Contemporary Art from the Van Hulten Collection, Museum Belvédère, Heerenveen September 7 - November 24, 2013, p. 122, with illu.

Today the monochrome canvasses and paper works that Yves Klein created in his characteristic color "International Klein Blue" (IKB) are considered icons of art history. They are visually perceptible expressions ofKlein’s desire for artistic liberation. The optical effect of the thickly applied blue color is confined by nothing else but the sheet’s edges, on close and intensive observation it even seems to go beyond this boundary and extend into space. In 1957, shortly before this work was made, Klein noted the following in his diary about his artistic strive for an absolute liberation of the color: "[..] in front of all the paintings I ever looked at I always have [had] the same Machiavellianfeeling of confinement, which, I believe, also was the reason that made Van Gogh scream out: >I want to break free from this dreadful cage!<. Van Gogh loved colors and perhaps unconsciously suffered to see them cut off by lines, contours, formsand compositions. What is generally perceived as a painting today is nothing but a window from a cell to me, its lines, contours, formsand compositionsare nothing butbarriers. To me lines are the concretion of our moribundity, our sentimentality, our intellect and even our spirituality. They are our psychological boundaries[..]! Color, on contrary, bathes in cosmic esthesia. To me esthesia has no niches. She is like humidity in the air. Color is materialized esthesia. Color bathes in everything and bathes everything." (Quote after: Sidra Stich, Yves Klein, Stuttgart 1994, p. 67). Entirely liberated from the constraintsof decryption and comprehension, this "Monochrome bleu" almost lets the observer bathe in a sea of blue, a meditative color space that unfolds a depth effect on the canvas. The Dutch collector Rolf van Hulten, whose renowned collection used to be the home of this work, was particularly attracted by the strong emotional value thatKlein’s blue color field emanates: "Abstract art, in my view, has to have a certain emotion. At times it tends to have a sense of the spiritual" (Rolf van Hulten, quote after Marita de Jong, An artwork has to become your child, in: A Collector`s Eye, Contemporary Art from the van Hulten Collection, Heerenveen 2013, p.107). Precisely because the collector van Hulten described every new acquisition for his long-established collection as a highly emotional event -the euphoric moment of buying is always followed by a period of emotional convergence - we are very delighted that we were able to win such a remarkable work like "Monochrome bleu" by Yves Klein for our auction. Hulten describes the processas follows: "I alwayshang a new work next to my bed. [..] So when I wake up in the morning, I can spend a quarter of an hour, while still a bit sleepy, looking at the new purchase. That´s quite nice, since it allows me to get to know the work. It has to become your child. Otherwise it will always remain a foreign object." (Rolf van Hulten, quote after:ibidem. p. 108). [JS]



816
Yves Klein
Monochrome bleu (IKB 242 A), Um 1958/59.
Mixed media
Estimate:
€ 150,000 / $ 162,000
Sold:
€ 187,500 / $ 202,500

(incl. surcharge)