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Lot Essay
'When I use nails my aim is to establish a structured pattern of relationships in order to set vibrations in motion that disturb and irritate their geometric order. What is important to me is variability, which is capable of revealing the beauty of movement to us' (G. Uecker quoted in D. Honisch et al. (eds.), Gnther Uecker: Twenty Chapters, Berlin 2006, p. 34).
Executed in 1965, Untitled is an early, hypnotic work by Gnther Uecker rendered in his signature nail motif. In the present work Uecker has created a remarkably tactile canvas via undulating protrusions of vertiginous nails. Uecker began in 1957 to swathe his paintings with an even coat of kaolin and white paint, creating his own structural expression of the monochrome. For Uecker, this absence of colour opened up a wealth of mystical possibilities. In his talk, 'White', held in 1965, Uecker defined the white space of his work as a 'space of spiritual existence', linked to the concept of the 'void' so celebrated by Yves Klein and a new world of silence beyond all screams' (G. Uecker quoted in D. Honisch, Uecker, New York 1983, p. 26).
Untitled is a poetic work that is simultaneously dynamic, in the ambulatory pattern of nails that creates an effect which refuses to abate, yet static in the physical force and exertion needed to fix the nails to the canvas. The irregular arrangement and variable density of nails across the canvas, like wind passing through long blades of grass or waves in the sea, resonates with the artist not only on a formal level but also on a personal one. Raised on the Baltic island of Wustrow in a rural town, this upbringing left a profound impact upon the artist who once asserted: '[my childhood] has a very realistic significance, because in fact earlier, as a farm boy, I always had great fun in driving the harrow or the seed planter with the horses straight toward the horizon without the furrows ever going off into curves. As a child by the Baltic I always sat by the water, and there I saw sky and water, earth and fire - they used to burn off the fields for the sheep to get rid of the dry grass. So I was familiar too with things in large dimensions' (G. Uecker quoted in R. Wedewer, Atelier 3, Gnther Uecker, Leverkusen 1980, p. 19). These visual recollections of surging landscapes and seascapes are deeply resonant with the optical forms of Untitled.
Executed in 1965, Untitled is an early, hypnotic work by Gnther Uecker rendered in his signature nail motif. In the present work Uecker has created a remarkably tactile canvas via undulating protrusions of vertiginous nails. Uecker began in 1957 to swathe his paintings with an even coat of kaolin and white paint, creating his own structural expression of the monochrome. For Uecker, this absence of colour opened up a wealth of mystical possibilities. In his talk, 'White', held in 1965, Uecker defined the white space of his work as a 'space of spiritual existence', linked to the concept of the 'void' so celebrated by Yves Klein and a new world of silence beyond all screams' (G. Uecker quoted in D. Honisch, Uecker, New York 1983, p. 26).
Untitled is a poetic work that is simultaneously dynamic, in the ambulatory pattern of nails that creates an effect which refuses to abate, yet static in the physical force and exertion needed to fix the nails to the canvas. The irregular arrangement and variable density of nails across the canvas, like wind passing through long blades of grass or waves in the sea, resonates with the artist not only on a formal level but also on a personal one. Raised on the Baltic island of Wustrow in a rural town, this upbringing left a profound impact upon the artist who once asserted: '[my childhood] has a very realistic significance, because in fact earlier, as a farm boy, I always had great fun in driving the harrow or the seed planter with the horses straight toward the horizon without the furrows ever going off into curves. As a child by the Baltic I always sat by the water, and there I saw sky and water, earth and fire - they used to burn off the fields for the sheep to get rid of the dry grass. So I was familiar too with things in large dimensions' (G. Uecker quoted in R. Wedewer, Atelier 3, Gnther Uecker, Leverkusen 1980, p. 19). These visual recollections of surging landscapes and seascapes are deeply resonant with the optical forms of Untitled.