Günther Uecker - Verletztes Feld. Poesie der Destruktion - image-1

Lot 772 Rα

Günther Uecker - Verletztes Feld. Poesie der Destruktion

Auction 1005 - overview Cologne
01.12.2012, 11:00 - Contemporary Art
Estimate: 50.000 € - 60.000 €
Result: 54.900 € (incl. premium)

Günther Uecker

Verletztes Feld. Poesie der Destruktion
1982

x6 Nails and latex paint on canvas on wood. 40 x 40 x 8 cm. Verletztes Feld Poesie der Destruktion Uecker 1982

Nails are a medium in Uecker's art and perfectly subservient to the artist's intentions. He succeeds in eliciting a wide range of expression from these rigid utilitarian objects: Nails can become fields that gently sway in the wind, totally forgetting their metallic nature. They can become places of tranquillity and peace, e.g. in the prayer room of the Reichstag building in Berlin. Often, however, Uecker also exploits the destructive potential of nails, as in this 'Injured Field - Poetry of Destruction'. The title alone indicates the ambivalence that characterises this work which combines two highly conflicting positions: violence and poetry.

'Injured Field'. Günther Uecker drove a large number of nails into a canvas-covered wooden board, tightly overlapping each other, so that they form an impenetrable field of nails. In fact, some of the nails were driven into the wood with such force that they protrude on the other side. The canvas, stretched over the wooden frame, was cut open in several places, so that the wood underneath is now visible and appears bare and naked. Sometimes the artist opened the surface even further by cutting deep notches into the wood, using an axe. He finished by treating the heads of the nails mainly with his hands, after dipping his fingers into white paint. It almost seems as if, by 'laying on hands', the artist wanted to tone down the aggressiveness of his action.

'Poetry of Destruction'. The fascinating element is the auratic effect of the work, caused precisely by Uecker's radical method. We can see that the artist wanted to express the duality of destruction and vulnerability and that he succeeded in translating this into aesthetic terms. Dieter Honisch also emphasises the very personal nature of Injured Fields which repeatedly occur in Uecker's oeuvre: “He [Uecker] discloses the motivation behind his work in a way that is almost psychoanalytical: affection, destruction and comfort. In doing so he releases those totally heterogeneous forces that influence the creative process. In fact, no other artist has ever disclosed their own intentions and feelings so clearly and ruthlessly when taking on the liability of a visually creative process. It is a form of teaching at an elevated level. After all, what Uecker shows is not the stages [...] that led to the creation of his works, but rather his psychological, contradictory feelings, even feelings that endanger the work itself. These are emotions with which an artist must contend within himself in order to create a work that is ultimately unique.” (Dieter Honisch, Uecker, Stuttgart 1983, p.156).

Certificate

With accompanying photo certificate from the artist

Provenance

Galerie Ehrensperger, Zurich; Private Collection, Germany