Sale: 591 / Day Sale, June 07. 2025 in Munich 
Lot 124000667
Lot 124000667 
124000667
Cerith Wyn Evans
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni, 1997.
Neon
Estimate:
€ 20,000 - 30,000
$ 21,600 - 32,400
Information on buyer's premium, taxation and resale right compensation will be available four weeks before the auction.
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni. 1997.
Neon.
Height ca. 12.5 cm (4.9 in). Diameter: 117 cm (46 in).
[CH].
• Evans initially worked with film, making a name for himself with experimental short films.
• Since the 1990s, he has also produced installations combining various elements like mirrors, neon lights, and philosophical texts to create complex visual objects.
• In his work, Evans engages with the ideas of his predecessors, prominent figures from cinema, philosophy, literature, and art.
• With the work offered here, the artist refers to the autobiographical documentary film of the same name released by Guy Debord in 1978, a leading figure of the Situationist International (SI), an (anti-)art movement of the postwar period.
• The film addresses the SI's critique of the spectacular, its quest to undermine authority, destroy symbols of power, and abolish art—even that of avant-garde.
• As a palindrome, the text (translated as “We wander in circles at night and are consumed by fire”) can be read both from left to right and backwards, which inspired the artist to create this circular neon work.
• The artist's installations are part of important international museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Tate in London, the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.
• In 2002, Evans' works were shown at documenta 11 in Kassel, followed by his participation in the 50th Venice Biennale in 2003.
PROVENANCE: White Cube, London.
Private collection, North Rhine-Westphalia (acquired from the above).
EXHIBITION: Neon. La materia luminosa dell'arte, MACRO / Museum of Contemporary Art, Rome, June 21–November 4, 2012.
Néon. Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue?, La MaisonRouge, Paris, February 17–May 20, 2012.
Wonderful. Humboldt, Krokodil & Polke, me Collectors Room, Berlin, November 29, 2012–August 25, 2013.
Schöne Grüße Thomas Schütte, me Collectors Room, Berlin, September 14, 2013–March 16, 2014.
"In contrast to artists who today treat Conceptual art simply as a historically established genre and a source of exploitable quotations, [Evans'] peripatetic motion (between art, cinema and literature) actualizes the original idea of conceptual practice: to create a free space, namely a stoa, which lies between all media, genres and disciplines, remaining open to all of them without submitting to the dominion of their rules and regulations."
Jan Verwoert about the art of Cerith Wyn Evans, quoted from: Melinda Braathen, Ten Questions: Cerith Wyn Evans, in: Kunstkritikk / Nordic Art Review, Feb. 4, 2011,
https://kunstkritikk.com/ten-questions-cerith-wyn-evans/
Neon.
Height ca. 12.5 cm (4.9 in). Diameter: 117 cm (46 in).
[CH].
• Evans initially worked with film, making a name for himself with experimental short films.
• Since the 1990s, he has also produced installations combining various elements like mirrors, neon lights, and philosophical texts to create complex visual objects.
• In his work, Evans engages with the ideas of his predecessors, prominent figures from cinema, philosophy, literature, and art.
• With the work offered here, the artist refers to the autobiographical documentary film of the same name released by Guy Debord in 1978, a leading figure of the Situationist International (SI), an (anti-)art movement of the postwar period.
• The film addresses the SI's critique of the spectacular, its quest to undermine authority, destroy symbols of power, and abolish art—even that of avant-garde.
• As a palindrome, the text (translated as “We wander in circles at night and are consumed by fire”) can be read both from left to right and backwards, which inspired the artist to create this circular neon work.
• The artist's installations are part of important international museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Tate in London, the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.
• In 2002, Evans' works were shown at documenta 11 in Kassel, followed by his participation in the 50th Venice Biennale in 2003.
PROVENANCE: White Cube, London.
Private collection, North Rhine-Westphalia (acquired from the above).
EXHIBITION: Neon. La materia luminosa dell'arte, MACRO / Museum of Contemporary Art, Rome, June 21–November 4, 2012.
Néon. Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue?, La MaisonRouge, Paris, February 17–May 20, 2012.
Wonderful. Humboldt, Krokodil & Polke, me Collectors Room, Berlin, November 29, 2012–August 25, 2013.
Schöne Grüße Thomas Schütte, me Collectors Room, Berlin, September 14, 2013–March 16, 2014.
"In contrast to artists who today treat Conceptual art simply as a historically established genre and a source of exploitable quotations, [Evans'] peripatetic motion (between art, cinema and literature) actualizes the original idea of conceptual practice: to create a free space, namely a stoa, which lies between all media, genres and disciplines, remaining open to all of them without submitting to the dominion of their rules and regulations."
Jan Verwoert about the art of Cerith Wyn Evans, quoted from: Melinda Braathen, Ten Questions: Cerith Wyn Evans, in: Kunstkritikk / Nordic Art Review, Feb. 4, 2011,
https://kunstkritikk.com/ten-questions-cerith-wyn-evans/
124000667
Cerith Wyn Evans
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni, 1997.
Neon
Estimate:
€ 20,000 - 30,000
$ 21,600 - 32,400
Information on buyer's premium, taxation and resale right compensation will be available four weeks before the auction.
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Hessen
Rhineland-Palatinate
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We will inform you in time.