JOHN M ARMLEDER, OLIVIER MOSSET, SYLVIE FLEURY, Three Monkeys, 1991
72,5 x 104 cm
screen print
edition of 100
signed, dated
€ 740,- plus € 18,- Track & Trace registered EU mail
inv.AMF 000-pr
In the nineties John Armleder told me the following. One day he, Olivier Mosset and Sylvie Fleury passed a shopping window in which three cuddly toy monkeys were put on display. They looked at each other and at themselves and Sylvie took a picture. Three monkeys forming the AMF clan under which name they regularly had exhibitions together. Not much later this screen print was made.
AMF is a word play of the artists surnames and a company named AMF / American Machine and Foundry that merged in 1969 with Harley Davidson Company. Its logo AMF refers also to one of the AMF artists Olivier Mosset, an enthousiastic Harley Davidson motorcyclist.
History of price:
Koller Auktionen, Zürich, Switzerland 27 June 2023 € 765,- (hammer price)
The Archive is Limited, Amsterdam July 2023 € 700,-
JOHN BALDESSARI, Hand and Chin (With Entwined Hands), 1991
33 x 22 inches
photogravure with colour spit bite aquatint
edition 25
published by Crown Point Press, San Francisco, USA $ 3,500.- June 2009
John Baldessari has created thousands of works that demonstrate the narrative potential of images and the associative power of language within the boundaries of the work of art.
GENERAL IDEA, Aids-Amsterdam Tram Project, 1990
62,5 x 63,7 cm
screen print on sticker
handwritten title: Amsterdam Tram Project edition 40, nr 2/40
signed, numbered and dated in black ink
exclusively made for and published by Museum Fodor, Amsterdam
very rare in this mint condition
sold
More than three decades ago in 1990 trams in Amsterdam were covered with this very early AIDS silkscreen poster of General Idea. The ‘Amsterdam Tram Project’ became quite controversial, i.e. conductors refused to drive their trams covered with the colourful and marked stickers afraid of giving their support to or at least being compromised and associated with homosexuality. Later on the artists group had other versions produced in larger editions.
In the mid-1980’s, the Canadian art group General Idea – AA Bronson, Felix Partz, and Jorge Zontal – created a symbol using the acronym AIDS, using the letters in a manner that resembled Robert Indiana’s LOVE logo. This witty allusion became part of Imagevirus, a project of paintings, sculptures, videos, posters, wallpapers and exhibitions that investigated the term AIDS as both word and image, using the mechanism of viral transmission. Imagevirus spread like a visual virus, producing an image epidemic in urban spaces from Manhattan to Sydney. It was displayed as, among other things, a Spectacolor sign in Times Square, a sculpture on a street in Hamburg, and a poster in the New York subway system. General Idea felt compelled to make Imagevirus at a time when AIDS was emerging as a global epidemic affecting gay men disproportionately.
Museum Fodor Amsterdam issued the posters in a signed and numbered edition. Beautiful and witty allusion of Robert Indiana’s famous LOVE icon.
B. WURTZ, Survival, 1989
10,2 x 14 x 0,6 cm
invitation card, hand stamped on cardboard
hand signed and numbered
edition 1045, here nr 13/1045
published by Feature, New York, USA
splendid condition
rare
€ 220,-
inv.BWur 851
SIGMAR POLKE, Untitled, 1989
98,5 x 69 cm / 38.5 x 27 inches
screen print on Schoellershammer 250 grams/m²
signed, edition 940
excellent condition
published by Griffelkunst Vereinigung, Hamburg, Germany
€ 1.000,- plus € 24,- Track & Trace EU registered mail
inv.SPol 000-pr
Sigmar Polke was the practicioner of large-scale works whose interest in cartoon and mass media was once called Capitalist Realism in Germany, and whose intensely varied marks yielded a lifelong inventiveness with form, media and chance.
The screen print edition Untitled 1989 of the Griffelkunst Vereinigung is part of the MoMA Print Collection, New York, USA.
History of prices:
Grisebach Auktionen, Berlin, Germany 18 August 2023 € 1.143,-
Nosbüsh & Stucke, Berlin, Germany 13 May 2023 € 800,- (hammer price)
1st Dibs, Hamburg, Germany, May 2022 € 3.400,-
Van Ham Kunstauktionen, Cologne, Germany, 6 February 2020 € 1.000,- (hammer price)
Jetschke-Van Vliet, Berlin, Germany, November 2020 € 900,- (hammer price)
GERHARD RICHTER, ‘Kerze’, n.d. [1988 Goslar Kerze]
89,5 x 94,5 cm / 35.2 x 37.2 inches offset
signed, edition 250
published by Verein zur Förderung moderner Kunst / Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst, Goslar, Germany
sold
still available: signed poster with text in very attractive high quality frame. Ref. Goslar Kerze, text, framed
Gerhard Richter’s Goslar Kerze is a reproduction of a painting called “Kerze” (1982), although image mirrored. Originally this motiv was used for a poster designed by the artist announcing his solo exhibition in Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst in Goslar in 1988.
In 2004 Süddeutsche.de Neueste Nachrichten announced a sudden appearance of Gerhard Richter’s ‘Kerze’ signed with the names Joseph Beuys and Georg Baselitz. “At that time I signed for fun also with Beuys and Baselitz”. This was not done as a provocation, but more in a spirit of “foolhardiness”.
Gerhard Richter signed with ‘Beuys’ and ‘Baselitz’.
The painter Gerhard Richter said he signed with names such as Beuys and Baselitz on early offset prints ‘just for fun’. He confessed this in the latest edition of “Monopol” magazine, published by Florian Illies. In 1988 Gerhard Richter signed 250 copies of his offset print ‘Kerze I’ at a price of 50 marks each, on behalf of the ‘Verein zur Förderung moderner Kunst’ in Goslar.
A few prints now popped up that show a completely different signature. Richter, who is now considered the most expensive German artist alive, said: ‘Back then I also signed with Beuys and Baselitz on them, out of burlesqueness.’ This was not a provocation, it was more “overconfidence”
Richter’s modest comment on “Kerze I” that was sold at Sotheby’s in New York last May for $ 26,400: ‘Of course, $ 26,000 is at least $ 25,000 too much.’
Süddeutsche Zeitung, 29.09.2004
History of prices:
Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst, Goslar, Germany DM 800,- December 1988
Auction House Ketterer Kunst, Munich, Germany € 7.500,- November 2011
RICHARD ARTSCHWAGER, Face, 1988
32 x 28 cm
screen print
signed, dated, numbered,
edition 7
published by Bébert / Contemporary Archeology Part III, Rotterdam
mint condition
€ 460,- plus € 18,- Track & Trace registered mail
inv.RArt 000-pr
Added background information
Although this print is made in an edition of 7 it is similar to the print that is part of a box published by House Bébert in Rotterdam as shown below.
History of prices:
eBay-Kunstwest, Cologne, Germany € 490,- March 2021
Heart Fine Art, Edinburgh, UK GBP 850.- July 2016
Catawiki € 160,- January 2014
SIGMAR POLKE, Untitled, 1988
98,5 x 69 cm / 38.5 x 27 inches
screen print on Schoellershammer 250 grams/m²
signed, edition 940
published by Griffelkunst Vereinigung, Hamburg, Germany
splendid condition
€ 3.800,- plus € 75,- courier costs
SPolk 555
Sigmar Polke was the practicioner of large-scale works whose interest in cartoon and mass media was once called Capitalist Realism in Germany, and whose intensely varied marks yielded a lifelong inventiveness with form, media and chance.
The screen print edition Untitled 1989 of the Griffelkunst Vereinigung is part of the MoMA Print Collection, New York, USA.
History of prices:
1st DIBS, Hamburg, Germany, May 2022 € 3.400,-
see also various auction results
Century ’87, 1987 each 16,2 x 82,4 cm
6 streamers, screenprint, limited edition:
‘Daan van Golden in de Hortus’
‘Nam June Paik in het Postkantoor’
‘Scholte en Dokoupil op de Wallen’
‘Pieter Laurens Mol op Solder’
‘Clemente in de Kelder’
‘Titus Nolte in de Oude Manhuispoort’
* In 1987 Sjarel Ex initiated Century ’87 together with Els Hoek and Nicolette Gast on behalf of Amsterdam Cultural Capital. It was an exhibition in the Amsterdam city centre featuring installations from 30 contemporary Dutch and foreign artists including Nam June Paik, Barry Flanagan, James Lee Byars, Boltanski, Sarkis, Daan van Golden, Rene Daniels and Marlene Dumas. The graphic design group Wild Plakken distributed the black and white streamers all over town in order to draw attention to the project. Very fine copies. Rare.
