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• Auction House:
  Bonhams Australia
• Sale Name:
  Sherman | 100
• Sale Date:
  11 May 2022 ~ 5pm (AEST)
• Lot #:
  51
• Lot Description:
  Michael Landy
  (British, born 1963)
  H.2.N.Y. Teenglee, 2007
  oil stick on paper
  28.0 x 38.0cm (11 x 14 15/16in). (each) (6)
  signed and dated verso (unsighted)
• Provenance:
  Sherman Galleries, Sydney (stamped verso); The Gene & Brian Sherman Collection, Sydney
• Exhibited:
  Man in Oxford Street is Auto-destructive, Sherman Galleries, Sydney, 19 July - 12 August 2007, cat. 6
• Notes:
  Michael Landy's Breakdown (2001), shown at Sherman Galleries in July 2007, was an unmitigated triumph. The act of pulverising all one's worldly possessions – including one's car, one's passport and the contents of one's bank account – paradoxically resonates at both positive and negative levels. Destruction can serve as a metaphor for purification and the human thirst for tabula rasa has been well documented in literature as well as in research relating to the human psyche. On the other hand, capitalist societies put high value on material possessions. One could well ask: why waste what has been diligently accumulated? Why destroy when one can build and prosper?H.2.N.Y. Teenglee (2007) relates to another quite separate act of destruction. Jean Tinguely's Homage to New York (1960), a deliberately selfdestructing kinetic sculpture created for New York's MOMA – was reprised by Michael Landy in a series of works on paper, of which the suite offered for auction is an excellent example.The show, which came to the Gallery via the good offices of John Kaldor, (an ongoing fan of Landy's work), was a major hit. People crowded into the Gallery space, mesmerised by images of the conveyor belt crushing the life and worth out of the full gamut of the artist's possessions and eventually, at the end of the line, spitting out parcels of shredded, useless content.In this apparently simple two-dimensional work on paper, abstracted wheels spin, turn and churn, capturing so much more than might at first glance be apparent. The machine age has been with us for a century and, with robots already at our fingertips, we might well ask the questions: How are we to go forward? Where is value to be found? Dr Gene Sherman
• Estimate:
  A$3,000 - 5,000
• Realised Price:
  *****
  

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• Category:
  Art

This Sale has been held and this item is no longer available. Details are provided for information purposes only.