Bettina. 1965.
Object. Light stele. Metal foil, wood and plexiglass, on aluminum foot with mirror surface.
Honisch 39 A. 245 x 24 x 2,5 cm (96,4 x 9,4 x 0,9 in).
A first version was made in 1964 under the title "Traum des Schachspielers" (cf. Honisch 39).

PROVENANCE: Collection Rainer Onnasch, Cologne (as loan in Folkwang Museum Essen until 1996).

The concept of the light steles goes back to the Sahara project that Heinz Mack first came up with in 1958. Based on the idea of a mirrored stele placed in a desert and catching the gleaming light making it a vibrating sun pillar. The first realized object in aluminum was on display in Paris in 1959. Numerous other variants in different materials follow, either free-standing or in transparent object boxes. Basicall, the steles are elongated versions of Mack’s light reliefs, that make the motion of light visible through reflection of bowed metal plates - an ambition that shows in all Heinz Mack’s art. [KP].