Go See – Cologne, Germany: Sigmar Polke ‘THE EDITIONS’ at Museum Ludwig through September 27, 2009
August 27th, 2009
From the Sigmar Polke show, “The Editions,” at Museum Ludwig.
Through September 27, Cologne will be home to the humor, irreverence, painstaking technique and meticulous renderings of Sigmar Polke’s “Editions.” Museum Ludwig is showing an exhibition of the collection, donated in large part by Cologne collectors Ulrich Reininghaus and Anna Friebe-Reininghaus in 2008. Curated by Julia Friedrich, the show also includes rare prints and re-workings.
Related links:
Museum Ludwig
Sigmar Polke – Profile [artfacts]
![Sigmar Polke's "Ohne Titel [Griffelkunst]" at Museum Ludwig. The editions](http://artobserved.com/artimages/2009/07/rba_d014944_500.jpg ";kla")
Sigmar Polke’s “Ohne Titel [Griffelkunst],” part of “The Editions,” at Museum Ludwig.
more images and story after the jump…
The show follows “Editions” through the forty years during which it evolved. Since 1963, Polke has numbered the works, experimented in offset printing and manipulated the photographs which serve as bases for his finished editions. He photographs street scenes, architecture, himself, and more — and then rips the photograph away from its subject in the darkroom, exercising upon it every operation and then some. Overprinting, enlarging, deliberate discoloration and exposure hiccups, create finally a collection of curiosities. Polke’s figures are deformed, his shadowing at many points unpredictable. The subject is changed in the artist’s rendering.
Sigmar Polke, “Kölner Bettler I,” at Museum Ludwig.
Sigmar Polke, “Mu nieitnam netorruprup,” at Museum Ludwig.
Sigmar Polke, “8 Zollstocksterne,” at Museum Ludwig.
Born in East Germany in 1941, Sigmar Polke studied art at Düsseldorf’s Staatliche Kunstakademie. He first became well-known at about 1963, when, together with Gerhard Richter, he helped pioneer Capitalist Realism. Since then, he has had solo shows at galleries around the world, including New York’s Michael Werner Gallery; Düsseldorf’s Galerie Schönewald und Beuse; Patrick Painter Inc., Santa Monica; Springer & Winckler Galerie , Berlin; Art & Public, Geneva; Galerie Karl Pfefferie, Munich; Tate Modern, London; Budapest’s Museum of Contemporary Art; Portikus, Frankfurt am Main, and more.
Sigmar Polke, “Experiment III,” at Museum Ludwig.
Sigmar Polke, “Eisberg,” at Museum Ludwig.
Sigmar Polke, “Fernsehbild (Kicker),” at Museum Ludwig.
- R. Fogel
