In his anniversary sale "5 to 118", PIASA auction proposes to collectors of contemporary art a work by the German artist Otto Piene (1928-2014).
In 1959, Otto Piene founded, with Heinz Mack (born in 1931), the ZERO group, whose ambition was to change the definitions of a modern art. Several artists such as Piero Manzoni, Yves Klein, Jean Tinguely and Lucio Fontana also collaborated in the group's magazine, published for ten years, from 1957 to 1967.
In 1944, at the age of 16, Otto Piene was mobilized as an anti-aircraft gunner. Between the great beams illuminating the black sky and the artillery fire in the depths of the night, the visual spectacle of the war marked the artist's imagination for a long time.
Otto Piene (1928-2014) Sans Titre (Rasterbild), 1959
Estimate : 250 000 / 350 000 €
After the war, from 1949 to 1953, it was on the benches of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and Düsseldorf that she forged a first artistic identity.
From the 1960s - and until the end of his life - the artist at the heart of the history of the scientific professor Harold Eugene Edgerton (1903-1990) and the astrophysicist Walter Lewin (born in 1936), both at the prestigious MIT.
Characteristic of its production of the late 1950s, the work presented for sale by PIASA is reminiscent of "Pure Energy", a work now preserved at MoMA.
Influenced by László Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946) and Fernand Léger (1881-1955), the aesthetic career of Otto Piene is characterized by experiences halfway between technique and science.
