(Uerdingen 1912–1990 Krefeld)
Convex mirror object, 1988, signed, dated on the reverse Luther 1988 and with the red stamps ENERGETISCHE PLASTIK and SEHEN IST SCHÖN, 4 x 4 convex mirrors, mirror, plexiglass, wooden plate, 161 x 161 x 7 cm, in plexiglass box

The work is a very rare one in Adolf Luther’s oeuvre.

Provenance:
Private Collection, North Rhine-Westphalia - directly from the artist

“Reduction, delimitation, auto-da-fé – all of this was necessary in order
to develop a new art with which I would finally be able to incorporate
the energetic side of reality. Overcoming the surface was probably
the most important step.”

Adolf Luther 1984

The phenomenality of Adolf Luther’s concave mirror object is not on the material surface, but through the reflection of the 4 x 4 concave, square mirrors. This creates a light-like phenomenality in front of the object that extends into real space. The concave mirrors reflect back what they reflected into real space on the level of their focal points. This is illustrated particularly well in the photograph of the work: on each of the concave mirrors, space is in this case static and appears as a “fore image” (according to Dieter Honisch) with minimally changed reflection. The concave mirror object was primarily created by Adolf Luther to reflect movements taking place in front of him in many ways. A static reflection, like on a photograph, is only made possible by consciously creating a laboratory situation. The intention of Adolf Luther’s mirror object is to prove light is a detectable form of energy in space by using the 4 x 4 concave mirrors.
Not only the movements of the spectator himself, but also the resulting alternate viewing angles, which lead to the changes of the reflections, are decisive for the inner movement of the “fore image”. “The spatial fore image takes on a life of its own. But the internally moving nature of the fore image still remains related to the concave mirror object as such. Its serial nature and simple structure of always identical elements, sticks in the consciousness of the viewer.” The serial and static mirror object enters into a tense relationship with the movements in front of it, so that it can no longer only be seen as an instrument for generating reflections. Rather, the object itself, in contrast to the constant change of the fore image and its reflections, is an element of permanence and identity - it is an object of the always permanent - in contrast to all movement and mobility.
cf. Max Imdahl, Adolf Luther, Licht und Materie, 1975, in Erläuterungen zur Modernen Kunst, Düsseldorf 1992, p. 156