A. R. Penck (d.i. Ralf Winkler)
1939 - 2017
Willst du oder willst du nicht. 1989.
Mixed mediaSilkscreen and acrylic on canvas.
Signed in the lower right. 130 x 160 cm (51.1 x 62.9 in).

• From the series “People and Animals After the Opening.”
• The cycle forms one of Penck's most important groups of works after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
• His visual language, developed in the early 1960s, is groundbreaking for artists such as Keith Haring, who engages with the art of his German colleague, which is exhibited in New York in the early 1980s.
• Complete provenance.

The authenticity of this work has been verbally confirmed by the artist (2008, catalog Ketterer Kunst A 345).

PROVENANCE: Private collection North Rhine-Westphalia (through Galerie Frank Hänel)
Privatsammlung Schleswig Holstein (2008 Kettererkunst) .

EXHIBITION: ar.penck - People and Animals after the Opening. Overpaintings 89 - 91, Frank Hänel Gallery, Düsseldorf, 2003, cat. no. ARP 6009, pp. 220 f. and 236, each with color ill.

LITERATURE: Ketterer Kunst, Modern Art / Art after 1945 auction, June 4–5, 2008, lot 406 (with color illustration).

“I also consider it completely unnecessary to add any explanations to my pictures.”
A. R. Penck, in: Kunstforum, Vol. 12, Ich über mich selbst (Me about myself)

During his creative period in the former GDR, the artist, whose original name was Ralf Winkler, adopted a series of pseudonyms, of which “A.R. Penck” ultimately prevailed. This chameleon-like change of name was a cunning response to the GDR's dogmatic cultural policy, as works of art could be more easily smuggled into the West under different “camouflage signatures.” On the other hand, the pseudonym Penck refers to the geomorphologist of the same name, whom the artist admires and associates with his work. After completing an apprenticeship as a commercial artist at an agency in Dresden in 1956, during which Penck taught himself the basics of painting, he struggled to make ends meet as a mail carrier, stoker, and night watchman, repeatedly harassed by the GDR cultural authorities. In the early 1960s, he created his first paintings featuring extremely reduced figures reminiscent of prehistoric symbols that would henceforth characterize his style. In the mid-1960s, his exploration of mathematics, cybernetics, and information theory culminated in “System and World Pictures.” While these, like the “Standard Pictures” that followed from 1968 onwards, feature a diagrammatic schematics, the spectrum of images expanded in the 1970s with striking color accents and large-scale, complexly filled image formats. From 1977 onwards, Penck transferred his symbolic repertoire of signs into three-dimensional space as wooden sculptures, which were also cast in bronze from 1982 onwards. In 1980, he was expatriated to the Federal Republic of Germany, which had long since recognized him as one of the most important contemporary artists. Since 1972, Penck has been represented several times at documenta, and in 1984 also at the Venice Biennale. In 1988, the artist was appointed professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Düsseldorf, a position he still holds today.
Our work is part of the series “Menschen und Tiere nach der Öffnung” (People and Animals after the Opening), which was created between 1989 and 1991. Each of the approximately 80 large-format canvas paintings is based on a silkscreen print that Penck reworked individually. The cycle forms one of Penck's most important groups of works since the fall of the Berlin Wall, in which the artist intensively engages with current events.

In good condition. On the right side of the picture, there is a smooth, professionally restored tear in the canvas, which has been retouched with great skill. This does not detract from the overall appearance. The condition report was prepared in daylight and with the aid of a UV light source to the best of our knowledge and belief.