Sculpture. Edelstahl auf Steinsockel
Unikat. Plastik: circa 59 x 46 x 46 cm (23,2 x 18,1 x 18,1 in)Sockel: 8,1 x 9 x 10 cm (3,1 x 3,5 x 3,9 in).

We are grateful to Sabine Kricke-Güse and Dr. Ernst-Gerhard Güse, Weimar, for their expert advice.

PROVENANCE: Private collection New York.
The Jewish Museum, New York.

EXHIBITION: Galerie Karl Flinker, Paris, 15 November -9 December 1961, Galerie John Levebre, New York, 11 April -6 May 1961, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2 March -2 April 1961.

Norbert Kricke was born in Düsseldorf on 30 November 1922. After 1947 - following his studies with Richard Schreibe at the Berlin School of Visual Arts - Kricke was active as freelance artist in his home town. Towards the end of the 1940s he made his first room sculptures from welded metal rods. In 1953 Kricke‘s first solo exhibition took place at the Galerie Ophir in Munich. Together with John Anthony Thwaites he wrote the first version of the exposé "Forms of Water" In the following year Kricke was awarded the 'Wettbewerb zur künstlerischen Gestaltung' of the Neue Stadttheater Gelsenkirchen, along with Robert Adams and Yves Klein. At the same time he took part in the 'Salon des Réalités Nouvelles' in Paris. As from 1955 Kricke received international public commissions, i.e., a large sculpture for the new opera building in Münster (1955/56), the design for the new state theatre in Gelsenkirchen (1957) and in collaboration with Walter Gropius the water lay-out for the new university building in Baghdad (1959) as well as the large sculpture in front of the County Museum of Art, Los Angeles (1965).

The focus of Kricke’s sculpting work in the late 1940s was on experimenting with concepts of space and time. Bundles of welded metal rods that narrow to capillary ramifications dynamically reach out into space. Kricke’s shiny creations, which fill the room like rays of light, have a filigree and agravic effect. With his sculptures Kricke ties in with the constructivist plastic works of artists around Naum Gabo and Antoine Pevsner, developing an incomparably beautiful style with his unique pieces. As one of the most important German representatives of informal art, Kricke’s oeuvre is not only presented on the documenta several times, but also attained international recognition as early as in the 1960s, by participating in, among others, the 32nd Venice Biennale or in the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

In 1964 he accepted a chair for sculpting and in 1972 the directorship of the State Art Academy in Düsseldorf, a post he held for ten years. Norbert Kricke died in his hometown on 26 June 1984. [JS].