(Uerdingen 1912–1990 Krefeld)
Optogon - optical glass stele, c. 1982, optical lenses, glass, plexiglass, 206 x 36 x 50 cm (incl. plinth), in plexiglass frame

Certificate:
Magdalena Broska, Adolf-Luther-Stiftung, Krefeld, 2.12.2013

The work is registered in the Adolf Luther Foundation, Krefeld under the number Opt/82/011.

Provenance:
Private Collection, North Rhine-Westphalia - directly from the artist
Dorotheum, Vienna, 20.05.2014, Lot 813 - acquired there from the present owner

Adolf Luther became a leading representative of conceptual light art in the 1960s and 1970s. Light was the foremost object of study in his scientific approach to art. Glass, mirrors and lenses became his most important materials. Making light physically tangible was the primary theme and goal of many of his works. In Adolf Luther’s multifaceted oeuvre, the Optogon object (an optical glass stele) belongs to the genre of lens and spectacle glass objects, which he created in many different versions from 1963 onwards. Through the spacing on the stele, loosely and haphazardly strewn with spectacle lenses, the work bears association with the first light objects created by Adolf Luther (beginning in 1962) — the so-called “light sluices”, in which he primarily experimented with fragments of glass. Loose arrangement of the lenses turns the stele into a kinetic work of art, as the lenses shift and rearrange themselves with every movement of the object. In this way, variable appearances are created again and again, which remain in their fixity and only become dynamic through physical interaction. Adolf Luther’s works capture movement, merging inside and outside into a whole, mixing thereby local conditions with levels of distortion and multiplication.

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