(born New Castle, Indiana in 1928) “Eight”.1965, oil on canvas, on the reverse stamped Indiana NYC Eight 1965, 61.3 x 61.3 cm, on a stretcher, (PS)

Provenance:
Galerie Alfred Schmela, Düsseldorf
Private Collection, North Rhine Westphalia

Robert Indiana’s striking shape paintings are some of the most radical expressions of Pop Art. Fascinated by the mysticism of numbers, the artist perceived in numbers manifold connections with significant events in world history, and to his own biography. During the late 1950s Indiana discovered commercial brass stencils in abandoned New York lofts, used since the 19th century for marking freight and trucks. He continued to use these for his shape paintings, thereby turning everyday typeface into art. 1964 marked the beginning of his “Exploding Numbers” series which took the ten cardinal numbers out of context, raising them to the status of symbolic emblems. Each number represents a stage of human development, with its own, consistent colour scheme. For example, the 1 is red and blue and represents the beginning of life. Number 6 is green and red, and symbolizes the zenith of life, the 0 is white and grey and stands for that which no longer exists, the condition of the unearthly, particularly emphasized by its lack of colour. Robert Indiana presents the number 8 in red and blue. In his series of life stages, the 8 symbolises the mature adult, at one with themself, on the brink of a new level of consciousness. Like the 0, the 8 can also be reversed and is presented in a horizontal position, the symbol of eternity.
For numerologists and numerical mysticists, the number 8 stands for eternity, the transition from the material to the spiritual realm, and rebirth on a higher level of consciousness, in a new life form. Mankind was created by God on the eighth day, and in today’s globally accepted Gregorian calendar, August is the eighth month of the year. This is the month of harvest and fertility. “The Numbers is a serial repository for formal dominions which, paradoxically, remain unnoticed over and above the emphatic presence which the number itself creates.” The demonstrative multitude of meanings of figure and background, object and subject, surface and depth, gives the “Exploding Numbers” their particular density and fascination. (William Katz, Robert Indiana, Stuttgart, 1971, p. 10)