(born Lollar, Hessen in 1931)
Light Relief, signed, dated mack 63 on the reverse, and with directional arrow, aluminium relief 29.2 x 34.3 cm, on black masonite, on wooden frame 44.5 x 49.5 x 1 cm, (PS)

Provenance:
Private Collection, Germany

Exhibited:
Goslar, Mönchehaus-Museum, Heinz Mack, 3.5 – 7.9.1997 Goslar, Mönchehaus-Museum, Onlight, Adolf Luther und sein Umkreis,11.5.-30.6.2013

Heinz Mack’s theoretical concept, based on light and movement, marked the start of a new perception of art at the end of the 1950s. He understood light, space and movement as new forms of media, directing his kinetically activated light spaces and sculptures straight towards the viewer’s perception, to enrich their everyday experience of seeing. “My sculptures are new objects in space, reflectors of light and instruments of movement.” (p.41)
The aluminium relief creates the illusion of movement, intensified by the choice of reflective material and continuing beyond the edge of the frame. It creates here an indistinct transitional zone, one that opens itself up to the surrounding space and unconsciously continues into it. “The disquiet of the line: it wants to become the surface; the disquiet of the surface: it wants to become space.” (p.41)
By reflecting the surroundings in the light relief, the borders between the object’s inner space and its exterior surroundings are consciously blurred. Heinz Mack uses the light relief to make visible the aesthetic movements, the vibrations of the art and the artwork. The dynamic structure and simple character of the components form the harmonious basis for this art. The straight lines of the relief stand in vertical or horizontal relation to each other, and it is particularly evident that they are not identical in appearance. Our eyes follow them, recognise patterns and shapes that, in the next moment, are broken up and reformed, appearing to be constantly moving. This gives the static light relief the appearance of change, it becomes dynamic and vibrates.
(Exhibition catalogue. Mack. Kinetik, Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach, 4 April – 25 September 2011, Düsseldorf 2011)

additional picture:
Heinz Mack talking with Peter Schenning,
Goslar 1997, © Mönchehaus-Museum, Goslar,