Dimensions: image: 295 x 210 mm
Copyright: © Helmut Federle | CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate
Editor: Here we have Helmut Federle's "Untitled" print. It's a striking work, stark black shapes against a white background. What do you see in this piece? Curator: I see a negotiation between control and chaos. Federle, working post-war, perhaps grapples with how to represent trauma. The seeming randomness of the blotches can mirror the fragmentation of the self, where the social context is uprooted. Editor: Fragmentation of self, I see what you mean. Curator: The bold black suggests to me an urgency, a refusal to remain silent. It speaks to the tradition of using art as a means of voicing resistance and bearing witness. Does that resonate with you? Editor: It does. I hadn’t considered the act of resistance through abstraction. Curator: Exactly! And perhaps that is the point. It prompts us to reflect on how we make sense of the world amid disruption. Editor: I see that now. I will never look at abstract works the same way.
Comments
Join the conversation
Join millions of artists and users on Artera today and experience the ultimate creative platform.
Blue Sisters, Structures of Deviance is a portfolio of ten prints executed in blue ink on white paper. Five are photogravures depicting trees. The other five are soft ground etching and aquatint on paper; these images are abstract and have a smaller plate size than the photogravures. The prints were produced at Druckatelier Kurt Zein in Vienna, where the artist lives and works. They were published in an edition of thirty-five with ten artist’s and publisher’s proofs; Tate owns number eleven in the edition.
CollectMore like this
