Sigmar Polke

Light Gallery, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner

Zurich, Kunsthaus Zurich; Cologne, Josef-Haubrich-Kunsthaller Köln, Sigmar Polke, April – October 1984, cat. no. 141, p. 127, illustrated in color

Gloria Moure, Ed., Sigmar Polke, Barcelona 2005, pp. 76 and 80-81, illustrated in color

This work is in very good condition overall. There is evidence of minor wear and handling along the edges. There is stable craqueleur within the denser areas of pigment along the left side, which is consistent with the use of mixed media and inherent to the artist's working method. There is a minor loss (⅛ inch diameter) along the left side of the canvas approximately 1 inch from the left edge and 30 inches from the upper left corner. Under Ultraviolet light inspection, there is no evidence of restoration. Unframed.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

"Wir sind durch is iconographically related to the theme of the colossal figures... the diabolical images, enlarged and deformed through the manipulation of graphic reproduction techniques." Gloria Moure in Sigmar Polke, Barcelona 2005, p. 80 Sigmar Polke’s Wir Sind Durch is a material exploration of the limits of painting, bringing together disparate mediums and conceptual approaches to lay bare the process by which artists create meaning. Polke first entered the artistic discourse in 1963, after he and his former classmates Manfred Kuttner, Konrad Lueg, and Gerhard Richter, installed an exhibition of their work in an empty butcher shop in Dusseldorf, dubbing their new commodity based, Pop art influenced style, capitalist realism. From then on, Polke consistently pushed at the visual limits of artmaking, orienting his artistic output to address the question of “what it might mean for mediums to infiltrate or become one another” (Mark Godfrey in “From Moderne Kunst to Entartete Kunst: Polke and Abstraction” in Exh. Cat., New York, The Museum of Modern Art, Alibis: Sigmar Polke 1963–2010, 2014, p. 136).

The present work, roughly bisected diagonally into dark and light, embodies this enduring thread of inquiry. The compositional structure of Wir Sind Durch contains myriad dichotomies: matte and sheen, weight and weightlessness, heaven and earth, figuration and abstraction. Taking up roughly half of the work, the upper diagonal of the canvas is an eruption of vibrant yellow drips and spray, spread out in serendipitous flecks. The pigment flares out in a lattice, as if slammed into the canvas, erasing evidence of Polke’s hand, and embodying a pure act of force as mediated by spray can and recorded in paint.

The more heavily worked lower diagonal is a frothy concoction, a mélange of semi-translucent acrylic, resin and spray paint. Rather than using spray paint to mediate his gesture, Polke uses a more passive process, applying pigments so that they spread out and mix, soaking into each other. When these materials come into contact, they create a cornucopia of visual effects; the lower side of the canvas is at once iridescent and also shrouded in opaque veils, as if coated in a glaze that runs from slate grey to a spectrum of aquamarines and violets all of the way to midnight black. Polke makes the resin synonymous with the support, capturing an inner glow akin to that of stained glass.

This portion of the work also contains a figure, delineated with a series of white dots and lines laid on top of the pigment saturated surface. Dots pervade Polke’s oeuvre, often highly condensed in the form of raster dots, which the artist transmuted into photography, video and painting in his constant blend of media and form. In the present work, Polke subverts that use, employing a form of abstracted pointillism to create an invented constellation, shifting the associations of his dots from technological processes to something more archaic and fundamental. Yet, despite this recognizable form, Polke has removed the figure’s function; constellations are intended to function as guides, yet in Polke’s painting, the subject is anonymous and their hands, which may be displaying a gesture, are cut off.

Wir Sind Durch is exemplary of the works in which Polke would, “introduce ghostly outlines traced from projected images or produced with stencils, into fields dominated by spills and spreads of liquid and powdered pigment” (ibid, 139). Polke’s methodology draws inheritance from Max Ernst’s technique of frottage, in which Ernst would rub his picture over a surface and then work into the shapes created by that random process. Polke’s works differ in that his shapes and forms were ascribed irrespective of what his underlying “random” process rendered. In his conflation of figuration and abstraction, rather than having his surface dictate the figure, Polke formed subjects irrespective of the surface, thus reinforcing the role of the artist as the locus of meaning.

An ironic distance and cynical stance towards the production of meaning pervades the essence of Wir Sind Durch. Polke’s constellation suggests the supremacy of order over chaos, yet it points nowhere and is illegible. In the words of Martin Hentschel, “whatever the starry heavens say to you: it could all be completely different. Therefore it is hardly surprising that Polke hones in on motifs that in themselves are concerned with the ‘transformability of things’” (Martin Hentschel in “Solve et Coagula” in Exh. Cat., Berlin, Bahnhof Museum für Gegenwart, Sigmar Polke, The Three Lies of Painting, 1997, p. 61). Wir Sind Durch interrogates society’s system of signs, miming the gestures of meaning and set of rules that govern the semiotic vernacular of art, yet upending them by exposing their boundaries, and the rules artists follow to stay between the lines.

 



We are most grateful to Mr. Michael Trier, Artistic Director from the Estate of Sigmar Polke, for the information he has kindly provided.