Walter Dahn (German 1954-) §
Taxi, 1986
£7,560
Auction: 28 October 2022 from 10:00 BST
Description
signed and dated (to reverse), spray paint and acrylic on canvas
Dimensions
240cm x 209.5cm (94 1/2in x 82 1/2in)
Provenance
Provenance:
Private Collection, London, since 1992.
Footnote
A pioneer of ‘Bad Painting’ and co-founder of the Mülheimer Freiheit group, Walter Dahn developed a style of painting. This questioned the idea of the medium in his simplification and appropriation of slogans, influencing a generation of artists known as the Neue Wilde (New Fauves) movement in 1970s and 1980s Germany.
‘We were all people who came from simple or middle-class backgrounds. The wild is also a large part of the attitude at that moment’ noted Dahn. The punk movement was an important influence on him and those painters around him. Indeed, Dahn explained: ‘For us, like the punk musicians, it was about creating images that we wanted to see but didn’t exist’.
With its broad brushstrokes, bright intense colours and slogan, Taxi evokes punk attitudes and opposition to the avant-garde movements of Minimalism and Conceptual Art that had been so pre-dominant. However, it still manages to poke fun at itself and the movement it espouses in its simplistic Pop forms.