Beck, Gerlinde (1930-2006), Untitled, 1973

Gerlinde Beck(1930 Stuttgart-Cannstatt - 2006 Mühlacker-Großglattbach), Untitled , 1973. Etching, 10.5 cm x 11 cm (image), 28 cm x 18.2 cm (sheet size), signed “g[erlinde] beck” in pencil lower right, inscribed “e.a. (artiste epreuve)” lower left, also with signed dedication.

- Edges occasionally minimally darkened, otherwise in very good condition

- Sculptural Ambivalence -

A conically cut cube, which towers over the picture format, floats on a fragile, multi-limbed substructure that is barely connected to the cube. The substructure itself hovers above the lower edge of the picture. This tension between mass and lightness, weight and levitation is intensified by the artist's use of printmaking to accentuate the metallic character of the sculptural structure.

"At the time, my work explored the aspect of the illusory. It is a play between two- and three-dimensional thinking."

Gerlinde Beck

About the artist

Gerlinde Beck studied at the Stuttgart Academy of Arts from 1949 to 1956 under Karl Hils, Peter Otto Heim, Gerhard Gollwitzer, and Willi Baumeister. She also trained as a precision sheet metal worker. In 1953, she took her first trip to Paris, where she encountered Henry Moore's sculptures and found inspiration in African art. In 1956, she married musician Hans-Peter Beck. That same year, she and Wolfgang Reiner founded a screen printing company that produced prints for Ida Kerkovius and Fritz Winter. After briefly working as a design teacher at an industrial company in Stuttgart in 1958, Gerlinde Beck worked as a freelance artist. From the 1960s onward, she was one of the leading sculptors of her generation in Germany. Starting in 1965, she created graphic works as well as sculptures. In 1968, the Kunsthalle Mannheim organized an exhibition of her art, and in 1969, the Wilhelm-Lehmbruck-Museum in Duisburg did the same. These exhibitions brought Gerlinde Beck international recognition. In 1974, her major work, "Klangstraße," was performed for the first time.In 1977, the Museum am Ostwall in Dortmund held a major retrospective of her art. This was followed by numerous public commissions. In 1984, she received the Federal Cross of Merit, and in 1989, she was awarded a professorship. In 1996, she founded the Gerlinde Beck Foundation at Schloss Dätzingen in Grafenau.

Through her light fugues, sound sculptures, sound spaces, and spatial choreographies, as well as her memory and foreboding images, she expanded the boundaries of sculpture.

"When my critics say I'm taking things to extremes, they're right. But I'm not turning the laws of physics on their head."

Gerlinde Beck