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拍品专文
Ghostly and molten, Thomas Schütte’s Kleiner Geist (Little Spirit), 1996, is a droll and sensitive sculpture from the artist’s celebrated series Geister (Spirits). With arms extended outwards, the statue stands proudly, its silver body glinting in the light. Schütte constructed his deceptively supple form from twisted spirals of wax which he then cast in mirror-finish aluminium creating a figure that is expressly shaped yet spontaneous, two central provocations for the artist. Schütte has described the process as life-giving, and indeed, each sculpture in the Geister series is unique: ‘I would rather talk with my hands and through forms and let these creatures live their own lives and tell their own stories. Avoiding certain fixed positions is important to me, avoiding being too classical or too predictable I always hope that in the end the work will be physically present. That the works lead to essential questions is important.' (T. Schütte, quoted in J. Heynen et al, Thomas Schütte, London 1998, p. 22). The Kleiner Geister served as inspiration for the artist’s Grosse Geister, made between 1996 and 2004. Larger-than-life, the Grosse Geister are held in museum collections including Centre Pompidou, the Museum of Modern Art Chicago and the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, among others.
‘Their faces’, wrote art historian Julian Heynan, ‘in turn, are sketchy and blank. Almost all of their concrete physicality exists solely within their fleeting gestures… One is reminded of those special effects, produced by the most advanced film techniques, in which a body materializes out of nothing, and can be transformed into another at any time… The condition to which they refer is extremely ambiguous, and cannot actually be named in its full absurdity,’ (J. Heynen, ‘Our World’ printed in J. Heynen (ed.), Thomas Schütte, London, 1998, p. 102). That Kleiner Geist cannot be classified amongst the known beings of the world is inconsequential. The figure is curiously and delightfully familiar, and Schütte's interest lies in the human gesture; Kleiner Geist is decidedly empathetic, mirroring the world in his gleaming surface.
‘Their faces’, wrote art historian Julian Heynan, ‘in turn, are sketchy and blank. Almost all of their concrete physicality exists solely within their fleeting gestures… One is reminded of those special effects, produced by the most advanced film techniques, in which a body materializes out of nothing, and can be transformed into another at any time… The condition to which they refer is extremely ambiguous, and cannot actually be named in its full absurdity,’ (J. Heynen, ‘Our World’ printed in J. Heynen (ed.), Thomas Schütte, London, 1998, p. 102). That Kleiner Geist cannot be classified amongst the known beings of the world is inconsequential. The figure is curiously and delightfully familiar, and Schütte's interest lies in the human gesture; Kleiner Geist is decidedly empathetic, mirroring the world in his gleaming surface.