Sigmar Polke

Alibis: Sigmar Polke at Tate Modern.

I did not 'get' Polke. Or maybe I should start at the beginning and the beginning for me when I see a work of art or go to an exhibition is first of all the emotional response: do I like it? Do I respond to it either emotionally or intellectually? Does it move me? I try not to read about an artist or the work until after I have seen and responded. With this exhibition I did not want to read or find out. I could not be bothered as I felt absolutely nothing when I saw the work except a feeling of being overwhelmed: it's all too busy, too chaotic, and in the end, for me, too tiresome.

This is how the review in the Telegraph finished: 'When the viewer doesn't have a handle on the moral or cultural context that made the image important to [him], we switch off. In the end, it's best not to over think this work and just enjoy the show as giant, constantly shifting kaleidoscope of photos, films and paintings, very much in the spirit of the 1960s'.

I am/was a child of the 1960s but this show did not 'do' it for me. There was no enjoyment, let alone any understanding. I switched off.

I did nevertheless take some photographs which I will post here as a reminder of what I saw.

Raster Drawing (Portrait of Lee Harvey Oswald), 1963

 

Polke looked closely at pictures in newspapers and magazines that were printed as 'raster' images made up of rows of dots. When these were blown up, the individual dots became more prominent and the image began to disintegrate. Polke painted the dots freehand at first, and then began to use punctured screens.

 

 

 



 

Untitled, 1963

(Do these remind you of another artist's work? These were painted in 1963, and they were painted by hand, rather in a factory 'by numbers')

 

The Ride on the 8th of Infinity III, 1969-71

 



 

 

 

Alice in Wonderland, 1972

  



During the 1970s Polke moved to a farmhouse in the countryside. Surrounded by friends they experimented with hallucinogenic drugs which led to new viewpoints and images. 

 

 

 

 

Untitled, 1972

 

 

Against the Two Superpowers - for a Radical Switzerland, 1976

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lump of Gold, 1982

 

 

 

 

Negative Value II, 1982

 

In this painting Polke used pigments that would change from purple to bronze when burnished. The canvas appears very different depending on the viewing angle and light conditions.

 

 

 

Scissors, 1982

The source for this painting is an image of the early 20th century Polish medium Stalinislawa Tomczyk apparently levitating a pair of scissors.

 

Fear, Black Man

 

Here Polke combined images of a crowd with upheld arms and a shadowy protagonist appearing to be about to launch himself in a jump, creating a scene that has been likened to prints by Francisco de Goya showing grotesque giant figures towering over terrified gatherings.  

 

 

 



Printing Error, 1986 

 

 

 

 

 

Watchtower 

 

Between 1984 and 1988 Polke made several Watchtower paintings, keeping the meaning deliberately ambiguous. Watchtowers like these are found throughout the German countryside and are used by hunters shooting game; they are also reminiscent of the towers on the periphery of Nazi concentration camps. Equally they are associated with the Berlin Wall and the border then dividing East and West Germany.