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PostWar & Contemporary
3471*
TONY CRAGG(Liverpool 1949 - lives and works in Wup-
pertal)
Discussion. 2005.
Wood. Unique.
170 x 190 x 240 cm.
Provenance:
- Acquired fromGalerie Thaddaeus Ropac,
Paris, by the present owner in 2006.
- Since then private collection.
Exhibition: Nürnberg 2005/2006, Tony
Cragg. Familiae. Neues MuseumNürnberg,
22 October 2005 - 15 January 2006.
„To my mind, the Rational-Being sculp-
tures function differently however – the
other way round in fact: you look at the
work and you see a face, and seeing the
face leads the gaze into the material, and
then you look at the other forms. And in
that moment, when you enter into the
forms again, away from the outline and
the surface of the work, you step outside
the normal axial view of the work, and you
begin to experience sculptural form in an
exceptional way.“ (cit. Tony Cragg, in: Jon
Wood imGespräch mit Tony Cragg, in:
Exh. Cat. Neues MuseumNürnberg, Tony
Cragg. familiae, 22 October 2005 – 15
January 2006, p. 10)
Tony Cragg, born in 1949 in Liverpool, is
one of the most influential and formative
sculptors of our time. Through his nu-
merous teaching activities and his position
as Director of the renowned Kunstakade-
mie Düsseldorf, he has influenced an enti-
re generation of sculptors. After the many
prizes, such as the Turner Prize in 1988
and the Cologne-Fine-Art Prize in 2012,
as well as his participation in documenta
7 and 8 and numerous biennials, his home
town of Wuppertal and the Hermitage
in St. Petersburg, are currently holding a
large retrospective of his work.
Tony Cragg has in the past five decades
created one of the most diverse bodies of
sculptural work in contemporary art. These
range from his early works in the 1970s,
which are characterised by the arrange-
ment and presentation of found objects;
to the so-called Early Forms, in which the
focus was the form of the vessel; to the
Rational-Beings, abstract sculptures in
which the contours of human faces appear.
These are never closed, self-sufficient
series of works: in each group of works we
find modifications and adaptations of the
same motifs – vessels/organs, axes/verte-
brae and skin/surfaces (see ibid, p. 18).
The present large format sculpture be-
longs to the group of Rational-Beings: as
viewers, we stand alongside the sculpture,
so that at first sight the idea of the axis
comes to mind. This runs throughout the
work and, as in a spinal column, there are
inclinations emerging at right angles, which
in this case serve as supports. In addition,
discs of different sizes, thicknesses and
forms are arranged around this axis, which
lend the piece a dynamic and, on the other
hand, despite the large size, a sense of
lightness. If we move to the transverse
side, our perception of the piece chan-
ges entirely. The slender, floating surface
becomes an almost square, compact
form, which appears to split. Seen as fully
abstract from the side, here we see two
faces turned towards one another. Cragg
achieves a powerful combination of two
different perceptions in one piece - an ef-
fect which does not antagonise the viewer,
but instead creates a fully harmonious and
conceptually coherent sculpture.
Through the use of wood, this piece has
a unique surface structure. The grains of
the wood, as well as the layers resulting
from the production process, create an
almost painterly surface. Unlike the flat
polished surface of steel sculptures, this
surface lends a sense of warmth and great
intimacy.
As the title suggests, the viewer is present
at the discussion, but unlike the works in
steel does not become part of this discus-
sion through their reflection in the surface.
CHF 300 000 / 400 000
(€ 277 780 / 370 370)