We would like to thank Michael Trier, Artistic Director for The Estate of Sigmar Polke, for his assistance.

Executed in 1991, following Sigmar Polke’s extensive and experimental exploration of colour throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, Untitled is exemplary of the artist’s mastery of alchemy and his extraordinary and energetic innovation. The gyrating form, an arabesque-like whirl of paint, is fused with subtle changes in tonality, inviting the viewer into the artist’s hallucinogenic universe. Completed five years after Athanor, the artist’s ground-breaking project for the Pavilion of the Federal Republic of Germany during the Venice Biennale of 1986, the present work highlights Polke’s concern with deconstructing imagery and opening new realms of interpretation. Harnessing the artist’s alchemic experimentations, the present work expertly synthesises Polke’s preoccupation with innovative forms and materials with the subtlety of tone.