Volvo. 1965.
Oil on canvas.
Signed and dated in the lower right. 110 x 145 cm (43.3 x 57 in). [JS].

The Barcode of Life - The Hans Braun Collection
More works from the collection are offered in our Contemporary Art Day Sale on Saturday, December 7, 2024.

• A year before the present work was created, the artists' group SPUR (1957-1965), co-founded by Sturm, exhibited in New York for the first time.
• “Volvo” (1965) - A fascinating testimony to the examination of American Pop Art and Hard-Edge painting.
• In this short phase of his work, Sturm developed a fascinating pictorial language from elements of Pop Art, Op Art and Hard-Edge.

We are grateful to the SPUR e.V. committee in Munich for the kind support in cataloging this lot.

PROVENANCE: In the artist's possession (until after 1999)
Galerie Helmut Leger, Munich (with the stamp on the stretcher).
Hans Braun Collection, Baden-Württemberg.

LITERATURE: Pia Dornacher / Bärbel Kleindorfer-Marx (eds.), Helmut Sturm. Works from 1957 to 1999, Cologne 1999, p. 70 (illu.).
Jo-Anne Birnie Danzker / Pia Dornacher (eds.), Gruppe SPUR, exhibition catalog, Museum Villa Stuck, Munich 2006, p. 182 (illu.)
Pia Dornacher, Lydia R. Hartl and Selima Niggl (eds.), Gruppe GEFLECHT, exhibition catalog, Rathhausgalerie Munich / Lothar Fischer Museum, Neumarkt i. d. Oberpflaz, 2007, p. 44 (ill.)
Annette Hüsch / Dörte Zbikowski (eds.), Dritte Welle. Die Gruppe SPUR, der Pop und die Politik, exhib. cat. Kiel 2013, p. 226/227 (ill.).

"The integration of text and speech balloons [..] heralds the influence of Pop Art on Helmut Sturm's imagery as early as 1964. However, the SPUR artists' socio-critical approaches to consumerism were irreconcilable with the ideas of Pop Art."
Pia Dornacher, Malerei als Zusammenspiel, in: Pia Dornacher / Bärbel Kleindorfer-Marx (eds.), Helmut Sturm. Arbeiten von 1957 bis 1999, Cologne 1999, p. 14.

To view artwork condition please click on the high-definition images and use the zoom function.