Sale: 496 / Evening Sale, Dec. 06. 2019 in Munich Lot 140

 

140
Christo
Package Teatro Nuovo Spoleto Pianta del Tetto (Project for opening night of the festival of two worlds 27 june 1968), 1968.
Collage with cloth, strings, staples and pencil...
Estimate:
€ 20,000 / $ 22,000
Sold:
€ 62,500 / $ 68,750

(incl. surcharge)
Package Teatro Nuovo Spoleto Pianta del Tetto (Project for opening night of the festival of two worlds 27 june 1968). 1968.
Collage with cloth, strings, staples and pencil on board.
Signed and dated in lower right as well as titled in lower margin. 56 x 71 cm (22 x 27.9 in), almost the full sheet.
[EH/SU].
• Early and important work in the artist's oeuvre.
• Intersting materiality and subtle consistency.
• Delicate play with the local circumstances
• From September 19 to October 4, 2020 Christo will wrap Arc de Triomphe in Paris
.

We are grateful to Mr. Matthias Koddenberg for his kind expert advice. The work is registered at the Archive of Christo and Jeanne Claude, New York.

PROVENANCE: Collection Manfred Moors, Essen.
Private collection Berlin.

EXHIBITION: Beck & Eggeling, Düsseldorf (verso with a label).
Christo and Jeanne-Claude: Early Works 1958-1969, Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin 2001, cat. no. 275, illu. on p. 181.

The methods and gestures of packaging, cording and the calm disguise that we encounter in all of Christo’s large-scale projects lead to a complete short-term disruption of the object's usability. The covered buildings no longer fulfill their actual use and loose their accustomed appearance. Our collage shows the cloaked Teatro Nuovo Gian Carlo Menotti in Spoleto. Next to the disguise of the Kunsthalle Bern and the "5,600 Cubicmeter package" at documenta IV, this project from 1968 is one of the first major projects of the artist couple Christo and Jeanne-Claude. The original plan was to completely disguise the three-story Teatro Nuovo in Spoleto as shown in our collage. However, they did not get the permission for fire safety reasons. Instead Jeanne-Claude chose the baroque facade of a house on the market square with a fountain, as well as a medieval tower outside the city center. Both projects were executed on occasion of the Festival dei Due Mondi, a festival of American and European music with parallel events in the USA and in Spoleto. [EH]



140
Christo
Package Teatro Nuovo Spoleto Pianta del Tetto (Project for opening night of the festival of two worlds 27 june 1968), 1968.
Collage with cloth, strings, staples and pencil...
Estimate:
€ 20,000 / $ 22,000
Sold:
€ 62,500 / $ 68,750

(incl. surcharge)