Sigmar Polke

Galerie Erhard Klein, Bonn

Private Collection, Germany (acquired directly from the above in 2000)

Private Collection, Germany

London, Christie's Mayfair, Polke / Richter: Richter / Polke, April - July 2014, p. 159, illustrated in colour 

Colour: The colour in the catalogue illustration is fairly accurate, although it fails to fully convey the pearlescent quality of the paint. Condition: Please refer to the department for a professional condition report.
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Executed in an elegant monochrome palette of black raster dots set against a painterly background of pearlescent shimmering pale blue and pink tones, Druckfehler (Printing Errors) masterfully appropriates Sigmar Polke’s own iconic pattern from his seminal Raster Bilder of the 1960s. Presenting an elaborate series of nineteen squares, the present work evokes a myriad of visual perspectives ranging from abstract forms in the upper register of the painting to figurative images of densely dotted episodes in the lower half. In a conflation of the visible and the invisible, specific image and blurred picture, recognition and distortion, the present work strongly reverberates with Polke’s longstanding interest in popular visual culture and echoes the practice of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein. By emphasising printing errors found in media images, Polke ultimately subverts the concept of the perfectly reproduced image and simultaneously celebrates mechanical mishaps as an aesthetic maxim.

In the series of Druckfehler, Polke imitated printing errors found in newspapers by appropriating the dotted, half tone process of commercial printing. By distorting and enlarging the actual printing mistake, Polke ultimately interrogates the nature of the image and what it consists of. Juxtaposing the mechanical printing process associated with the seamless mass production of immaculate pictures with the failure of the very same technique, Polke scrutinises our perception of the image and its role as the purveyor of factual and visual truth. The printing mistakes immediately distort the clarity and stability of the original media image and prevent the viewer from associating it with its intended meaning. Indeed, Polke was deeply aware of the powerful influence of mass media and its monopoly on forming opinions. His non-conformative approach to art making was a rebellion against all forms of authority; in a Duchampian manner of appropriating ready-made artefacts such as newspaper images, and even more so imperfect ones, Polke introduces the everyday image into the realm of fine art, thereby abolishing the dichotomy of high and low culture.

By emphasising mistakes in this revered series, Polke revels in the idea of mishaps as an aesthetic possibility. By allowing a work to exist by nature of initial failure, Polke elevates what is perceived as error and invests it with mesmerising visual allure. Similar to artists such as Andy Warhol and Christopher Wool, Polke introduces the concept of failure as a seductive visual paradigm to create works that scrutinise the viewer’s initial perception of beauty and ultimately question what a work of art is. This idea is further exacerbated in Druckfehler through the seemingly endless flow and repetition of imagery that fails to meet its claim to smooth perfection. The dots used to convey the source image vary in density, sharpness, and shape, and what used to be a clear image ultimately shifts in and out of focus, blurred into a visual distortion of ambiguity and drowned within a sea of expressive brushstrokes.

Polke’s dedicated interest in the formal and theoretical elements that differentiate abstraction from figuration, by means of merging the two within one work, is brilliantly displayed in the present painting. Oscillating between clarity and distortion, Druckfehler appropriates Polke’s idiosyncratic raster pattern to produce a work of utmost visual appeal that is charged with conceptual significance.