.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
‘The spiral is the symbol of life and death. The spiral lies at the very point where inanimate matter is transformed into life. It is my conviction that this has a religious basis, and the scientists confirm it too, that life must begin somewhere and that development from a lifeless matter has taken the form of a spiral. I am convinced for example that the act of creation has the nature of a spiral. […] The spiral is constantly to be observed in lower and higher living organisms. The distant stars are disposed in spiral formations, and so are the molecules. Our whole life proceeds in spirals.’
—FRIEDENSREICH STOWASSER HUNDERTWASSER
With its rippling formation of primary colours, Hundertwasser’s The Annunciation of Good Tidings (1956) manifests into a pulsating cellular composition that carries the viewer’s eye into the work’s vortex. The flowing lines of Hundertwasser’s spiral motif are enlivened by the artist’s contrast of pigmentation and texture, delineations of colour that instil the work with a subdued movement. His disparate mediums ranging across watercolours, oils, fish glue and gold leaf, the densely textural surface, as well as his primal use of colour limited to shades of red, yellow, blue, and earthy brown, imbue the work with a natural vitality. Re-appropriating the biblical Annunciation for modern times, Hundertwasser suffuses his abstract scene with the life force he believed to be inherent in the spiral, rejecting what he called the ‘godless and immoral straight line for the creative spiral… organic and energised, propagating the artist’s simple truth of life and nature (F. Hundertwasser, ‘Mouldiness Manifesto Against Rationalism in Architecture’, in Austria Presents Hundertwasser to the Continents, exh. cat., Gruener Janura AG, Glarus/ Switzerland, 1980, p. 441).
Hundertwasser’s unique abstract style reveals his interest in nature’s relation to the primordial and childhood wonderment, as well as his personal views on the development of modern art. Created in the mid-1950s, the composition reflects a period in which Hundertwasser worked to contribute to development of modern art. In a number of writings he proposed a style of ‘Transautomatism’ in which he believed to transcend the automatism of Tachisme and Art Informel by incorporating artistic developments that inspire a new way of viewing unfamiliar scenes and interacting with nature – above all his use of natural pigments that he created himself, and his obsession with the spiral. Working nearly a decade after the Second World War, Hundertwasser no longer saw the line as a symbol of progress, but instead viewed it as limited in its potential movement towards downfall, and in its inability to convey complexities. Hundertwasser’s sinuously rich decorative style has drawn comparisons to his Viennese predecessors Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele in its derivation of formal elements from Art Nouveau and Viennese Secessionism. However, despite these similarities, Hundertwasser is fundamentally concerned with man’s relationship to the earth, and The Annunciation of Good Tidings demonstrates his desire to liberate his works from the rigid architecture that he considered destructive to human nature.
—FRIEDENSREICH STOWASSER HUNDERTWASSER
With its rippling formation of primary colours, Hundertwasser’s The Annunciation of Good Tidings (1956) manifests into a pulsating cellular composition that carries the viewer’s eye into the work’s vortex. The flowing lines of Hundertwasser’s spiral motif are enlivened by the artist’s contrast of pigmentation and texture, delineations of colour that instil the work with a subdued movement. His disparate mediums ranging across watercolours, oils, fish glue and gold leaf, the densely textural surface, as well as his primal use of colour limited to shades of red, yellow, blue, and earthy brown, imbue the work with a natural vitality. Re-appropriating the biblical Annunciation for modern times, Hundertwasser suffuses his abstract scene with the life force he believed to be inherent in the spiral, rejecting what he called the ‘godless and immoral straight line for the creative spiral… organic and energised, propagating the artist’s simple truth of life and nature (F. Hundertwasser, ‘Mouldiness Manifesto Against Rationalism in Architecture’, in Austria Presents Hundertwasser to the Continents, exh. cat., Gruener Janura AG, Glarus/ Switzerland, 1980, p. 441).
Hundertwasser’s unique abstract style reveals his interest in nature’s relation to the primordial and childhood wonderment, as well as his personal views on the development of modern art. Created in the mid-1950s, the composition reflects a period in which Hundertwasser worked to contribute to development of modern art. In a number of writings he proposed a style of ‘Transautomatism’ in which he believed to transcend the automatism of Tachisme and Art Informel by incorporating artistic developments that inspire a new way of viewing unfamiliar scenes and interacting with nature – above all his use of natural pigments that he created himself, and his obsession with the spiral. Working nearly a decade after the Second World War, Hundertwasser no longer saw the line as a symbol of progress, but instead viewed it as limited in its potential movement towards downfall, and in its inability to convey complexities. Hundertwasser’s sinuously rich decorative style has drawn comparisons to his Viennese predecessors Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele in its derivation of formal elements from Art Nouveau and Viennese Secessionism. However, despite these similarities, Hundertwasser is fundamentally concerned with man’s relationship to the earth, and The Annunciation of Good Tidings demonstrates his desire to liberate his works from the rigid architecture that he considered destructive to human nature.