(Nice 1928–1962 Paris)
Eponge bleue, blue pigment, synthetic resin and natural sponge, 6 x 3.5 cm, on metal pole with base (mounted by the estate), 18 x 4.5 x 6 cm, (PS)

Photo certificate:
Rotraut Klein-Moquay, Paris, 11.7.2013
The work has been registered by the Yves Klein archive under the archive no. SE 301.

“In 1957 Yves Klein had spread a layer of pure blue pigment on an area of floor during an exhibition of his work at Collette Allendy’s gallery. He intended that nothing would diminish the intensity of its brilliance - for the binding agent needed to fix the colour particles to a medium always changes their original quality. With the assistance of his supplier, Edouard Adam, the artist developed the formula for a synthetic resin that would retain the shine of the pure pigment he found so entrancing much better than oil. This well-known incident gave rise to most fanciful elaboration; however, in spite of a persistent legend, International Klein Blue (IKB) was never actually patent protected.”(p. 87) Yves Klein postulated that the colour should saturate the space. What could exemplify this better than a sponge?! He went even further, according his viewers the capacity of a sponge, able to totally absorb “all liquid” (…) “Thanks to the sponge, this natural, living material, I can make portraits of the viewers of my monochromes who, after they have seen and contemplated the blue in my works, return like sponges soaked with sensitivity.” “The sponge and saturation metaphors complement one another....more poet than scientist, more sophist than philosopher, Klein tries to draw us along his trail into a universe with its fiction of a single path to truth and beauty.” (p.91f) Elsewhere he says: “I think I can say: my pictures represent poetic events. Or rather: they are immobile, silent, static witnesses to the essence of movement and of life in freedom, the flame of poetry in the painted moment.” Klein uses the term impregnation in this context, wishing to explain how “an inexpressible poetic moment” enters the painting material.” (p. 89)
(Denys Riot: Imprägnationen: Szenarios und Szenografien, in the exhibition catalogue Yves Klein, Die blaue Revolution, Mumok Vienna 2007, p. 86–101)