ANTONI TÀPIES (1923-2012)

“I wanted the canvas to be sort of like a talisman, so that when you touch it, you feel healing energy for example. Ideally, you would take a small painting, when you have a headache, and by touching it with your head, it would give you energy that heals you. Let’s just say that each material expresses itself in its own way. You have to let them speak. They already have an expressive charge.(A.TAPIES http:/fresques.ina.fr/europe-des-cultures-en/fiche-media/Europe00223/conversation-with-antoni-tapies.html)

Christie’s is proud to present three works by Serge Poliakoff, Antoni Tàpies and Günther Uecker from one of Switzerland’s most important art collections. All three works, offered across our October Day and Evening Auctions, are from a collection with very close ties to the legendary Erker-Galerie in St. Gallen. The Erker-Galerie was founded in 1958 in St. Gallen by Franz Larese and Jürg Janett, and soon established itself as one of the most innovative galleries in Europe. For many decades the gallery not only showed the avant-garde of its times, with exhibitions of works by artists such as Max Bill, Chillida, Dix, Dorazio, Motherwell, Piene, Poliakoff, Tàpies and Uecker among many others, but also established itself as a meeting point for novelists, writers and intellectuals. Most of the works from the collection were purchased directly from the artists as a result of the deep friendship that was established over the years between the artists, the gallery and the collector.