Lot Description

Thomas Schütte (b. 1954)
Etwas Fehlt (Something Missing)
signed, inscribed and dated 'Neon außen Th. Schütte 25.10.80' (lower right)
felt-tip pen and spray paint on paper
19 7/8 x 23 7/8in. (50.5 x 60.6cm.)
Executed in 1980

Special Notice

Artist's Resale Right ("droit de Suite"). If the Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer also agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent.

Provenance

Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner in 2001.

Pre-Lot Text

IMAGINATION BECOMES REALITY
A SELECTION OF WORKS FROM THE GOETZ COLLECTION SOLD TO BENEFIT CHARITY PROJECTS

Exhibited

Munich, Sammlung Goetz, Thomas Schütte, 2001 (illustrated in colour, p. 15).

Lot Notes

A blueprint for a yellow neon light to be displayed outside, Etwas Fehlt is a bold and direct statement that 'Something is missing'. Centred in the midst of a black cloud of sprayed paint, the clear Sans-serif letters express an anxiety at the beginning of a new decade - what is it that is missing at the beginning of the 1980s? Like Sol LeWitt and Bruce Nauman's drawings from the 1960s and early 1970s, Etwas Fehlt' has bold aesthetic appeal but is principally about the underlying concept. Asked for whom Schütte makes works of art for, the artist replied: 'That's an interesting question, for what or for whom you're actually working. Is it doing the work, is it the family, is it fame, is it money? At the moment it's a very open question. I still think that the arts should somehow be religious'.

(T. Schütte, quoted in Thomas Schütte, exh. cat., Sammlung Goetz, Munich 2001, p. 88).