Yves: Peintures
Encyclopedia
Yves Klein
Yves Klein was a French artist considered an important figure in post-war European art. He is the leading member of the French artistic movement of Nouveau réalisme founded in 1960 by the art critic Pierre Restany...
, originally published in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, 18 November 1954 .
This publication was Klein’s first public gesture as an artist, featuring pages of 'commercially printed papers ' that were seemingly reproductions of paintings that, in fact, didn't exist. Using a practice started by Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
, this use of readymade objects to represent nothing but themselves has been referred to as an early example of Postmodernism
Postmodernism
Postmodernism is a philosophical movement evolved in reaction to modernism, the tendency in contemporary culture to accept only objective truth and to be inherently suspicious towards a global cultural narrative or meta-narrative. Postmodernist thought is an intentional departure from the...
, using a series of carefully executed strategies to undermine its own authority, and as a precursor to conceptual art
Conceptual art
Conceptual art is art in which the concept or idea involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns. Many of the works, sometimes called installations, of the artist Sol LeWitt may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions...
. 'The simplicity of his readymades is at once sublime and mischievous.'
"The booklet asserts its character straightaway in the preface: a wordless text of unbroken horizontal lines with the same two paragraph indentations on each page.... a homogenous continuum with no real beginning, middle, or end, and no content - at least insofar as there are no descriptions, analyses, or personalized utterances. The colour plates are similarly presented as anonymous entities, each a flat spatial field of an uninflected hue: turquoise, brown, purple, green, pink, gray, yellow, ultramarine, mint, orange, or red. Here, too, there is no attempt to represent or symbolize anything....
The booklet thus offers an utterly pared down presentation. Unlike most art books, it provides no reverential prose about the artist or the art, and no embellishing descriptions meant to convey meaning or context. Instead the booklet itself is made into a work of art that shares the same spirit of nothingness exemplified by the monochrome paintings that it features." Sidra Stich
Zen Philosophy and Kōdōkan Judo
Max Heindel
Max Heindel - born Carl Louis von Grasshoff in Aarhus, Denmark on July 23, 1865 - was a Christian occultist, astrologer, and mystic. He died on January 6, 1919 at Oceanside, California, United States.- Early infancy :...
The Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception or Mystic Christianity, which taught that 'space equals spirit and life, that matter is inert form, [and] that sponges and water symbolize the saturation of matter with spirit , he later rejected these teachings for a more rigorous study of the philosophy behind Judo
Judo
is a modern martial art and combat sport created in Japan in 1882 by Jigoro Kano. Its most prominent feature is its competitive element, where the object is to either throw or takedown one's opponent to the ground, immobilize or otherwise subdue one's opponent with a grappling maneuver, or force an...
, which involved long periods of meditation with his friends Arman
Arman
Arman was a French-born American artist. Born Armand Pierre Fernandez in Nice, France, Arman is a painter who moved from using the objects as paintbrushes to using them as the painting itself...
and Claude Pascal.
His second private exhibition of monochromes took place whilst Klein was in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
, late 1953, around the same time as he earned a diploma from the Kōdōkan Institute
Kodokan
, or the Kodokan Institute, is the headquarters of the worldwide judo community. Literally, kō means "to lecture" or "to spread information," dō means "the way," and kan is "a public building or hall," together translating roughly as "a place for the study or promotion of the way." The Kodokan was...
, as a fourth degree Dan
Dan (rank)
The ranking system is a Japanese mark of level, which is used in modern fine arts and martial arts. Originally invented in a Go school in the Edo period, this system was applied to martial arts by Kanō Jigorō, the founder of judo and later introduced to other East Asia countries.In the modern...
, achieving the highest level possible for a European .
'The philosophy of ZenZenZen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
, which is essentially prevalent in Kōdōkan judo, being primarily concerned with an increased sensitivity for the present and an extended concept of space and time, [meant] a new form of spirituality for Klein, and [had] a direct effect upon his artistic activities.'
Upon his return to Paris in February 1954, he was deeply upset to discover that his diploma would not be officially recognised by the French Federation of Judo, meaning he could not officially teach or effectively participate in French Judo activities . He responded by publishing a book, Les Fondements du Judo, (see http://www.theeverydaypress.net/), studying six Katas formulated by Kanō Jigorō
Kano Jigoro
was the founder of judo. Judo was the first Japanese martial art to gain widespread international recognition, and the first to become an official Olympic sport. Pedagogical innovations attributed to Kanō include the use of black and white belts, and the introduction of dan ranking to show the...
in the 19th century, in an attempt to establish a reputation in France by circumventing the federation. Unable to teach in France, he took a post in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
in May. It was whilst he was in Spain that he formulated and published his first public gesture as an artist: Yves Peintures.
The Book Itself
Yves Peintures is a small booklet, 24.4 cm by 19.7 cm, containing 16 sheets of unbound paper, each printed on one side only and 10 containing tipped-in sheets of coloured paper. Starting with a preface of 3 pages consisting entirely of horizontal black lines designed to parody a traditional introduction credited to ‘Pascal Claude’, (Claude Pascal, a close friend of Klein’s), the introduction was actually designed by Klein himself, persuading Pascal to sign it to ‘certify the production’.10 vivid monochromatic plates follow, mechanically signed ‘Yves’, each given unspecified numerical dimensions and assigned a large city.
If, as is usual in exhibition catalogues, the dimensions refer to centimetres, the plates would represent medium sized easel paintings; if metres, large frescoes; if millimetres, then the plates are life size, leading to the conclusion that, rather than illustrations, they are the work itself. Klein would later create work in all three categories.
The cities are all places Klein had lived and worked in the preceding 4 years, implying either that the idea for each work had come to him in the relevant city, or that the work was an abstract representation of the city’s atmosphere. There are three versions of the book; one in which the plates have the name Yves next to the cities with a date; one with additional information about the size of each work, and one in which the entire work is credited to 'Haguenault'.
Haguenault Peintures is basically the same book, and was published at the same time, but attributed to a different, unknown, artist. Curiously, some of the plates are still mechanically signed ‘Yves’, part of a series of deliberate strategies to undermine the works’ integrity, leading some critics, such as Pierre Restany, to call Klein an early post-modernist. The main structural difference was the accrediting of ownership in the captions (Collection Particuliere, Collection Orickson, Collection Raymond Hains, etc). This implies the (fictional) artist was a painter of some stature, with work collected in major collections.
According to Raymond Hains
Raymond Hains
Raymond Hains was a French artist and photographer.-Biography:In 1945, Hains briefly enrolled in the sculpture course at the École des Beaux-Arts, Rennes and met Jacques de la Villeglé that same year. He then collaborated with E. Sougez as a photographer for France-Illustration...
, a close friend of Klein's at the time, Klein had named his pseudonym after a brand of gingerbread.
“ The fact that there were two different monochrome artists featured in two nearly identical booklets augmented the manifestations of doubling, duplication and duplicity that lay at the core of the project.” Sidra Stich
Lettrism and the Readymade
Klein was in contact at this time with key advocates of LettrismLettrism
Lettrism is a French avant-garde movement, established in Paris in the mid-1940s by Romanian immigrant Isidore Isou. In a body of work totaling hundreds of volumes, Isou and the Lettrists have applied their theories to all areas of art and culture, most notably in poetry, film, painting and...
, a group of French avant garde artists who were challenging the assumed authority of texts by creating ‘an experiential language that was to be the basis of (the) new culture.’ By 1952, he had seen various works by key members of the group, including Isidore Isou
Isidore Isou
Isidore Isou , born Ioan-Isidor Goldstein, was a Romanian-born French poet, film critic and visual artist...
, and by Dufrêne, Gil J. Wolman
Gil J. Wolman
Gil Joseph Wolman was a French artist, born in Paris in 1929 and dying there in 1995. His work encompassed painting, poetry and film-making. He was a member of Isidore Isou's avant garde Letterist movement in the early 1950s, then becoming a central figure in the Letterist International, the group...
& Guy Debord
Guy Debord
Guy Ernest Debord was a French Marxist theorist, writer, filmmaker, member of the Letterist International, founder of a Letterist faction, and founding member of the Situationist International . He was also briefly a member of Socialisme ou Barbarie.-Early Life:Guy Debord was born in Paris in 1931...
, and had become a close friend of Dufrêne in particular. The lettrists advocated challenging textual authority, and would serve as a direct reference point for the introduction. He was also familiar with the work of Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
, having given a copy of the 1947 artist's book Le Surrealisme, designed by Duchamp with a famous cover of a 3D breast, to his friend Arman
Arman
Arman was a French-born American artist. Born Armand Pierre Fernandez in Nice, France, Arman is a painter who moved from using the objects as paintbrushes to using them as the painting itself...
. Duchamp's theories about the readymade, and his belief in the viewer making the meaning of a work of art, would be central to Yves Peintures .
'[Klein] dismissed line as a ‘tourist walking across the space’. For him lines were a ‘prison grating’, whereas the fine individual particles of colour were an expression of ‘total freedom’. He attempted to free himself from all materiality through the totality of colour. In gold, red and especially dark, deep ultramarine blue he found colours that corresponded adequately to his visions of the immaterial and the infinite. He wanted to induce independent sensations, feelings and reactions in viewers without giving them a depicted object or an abstract sign as a starting-point, just by means of the state and effect of the colour. He saw monochrome as an ‘open window to freedom, as the possibility of being immersed in the immeasurable existence of colour’ Ulrike Lehmann
Editions
The book was published by Fernando Franco de Sarabia’s engraving workshop in Jaen near Madrid, in a numbered edition of 150 ; despite this, there are believed to only be around 10 copies in existence . Yves Peintures has since been re-published by Editions Dilecta, Paris in 2006 in an edition of 400.Reception
The book seems to have had a small but influential impact on the Parisian Art scene; using Yves Peintures to gain entry into the Parisian art world , he managed to secure an exhibition of monochromes at the Club Des Solitaires, Paris, opening on October 15 1955.
'Yesterday night, Wednesday, we went into an abstract café… the abstractionists were there. They are easy to recognize because they give off an atmosphere of abstract painting, plus you see their paintings in their eyes. Maybe I’m delirious, but I have the impression I see things like that. In any event, we sat down with them. Then we began speaking of the book Yves Peintures. Later, I went to get it from the car and I laid it down on the table. At the very first few pages the abstractionists’ eyes began to change. Their eyes lit up and in the depths, pure, beautiful single colors appeared.' Paris newspaper, dated January 13, 1955
Other Artist's Books and Multiples by Yves Klein
- Zones of Immaterial Pictorial SensibilityZone de Sensibilité Picturale ImmatérielleZone de Sensibilité Picturale Immatérielle is an artist's book and performance by the French artist Yves Klein...
(1959-62) - DimancheDimancheDimanche , also known as Dimanche - Le Journal d'un Seul Jour is an artist's book by the French artist Yves Klein...
(1960) - Catalogue for "Yves Klein: Monochrome und Feuer" at the Museum Haus Lange, Krefeld, Germany (1961)