Wolfgang Tillmans – It’s Only Love Give It Away – 2005, Offsetprint, edition of 500, size: 84 x 59,5 cm © Wolfgang Tillmans, courtesy Galerie Buchholz, Berlin/Cologne. SORRY Sold.
Wolfgang Tillmans – It’s Only Love Give It Away – 2005, Offsetprint, handsigned, unknown edition size, ca. 20 – 30. Size 84 x 59,5 cm © Wolfgang Tillmans, courtesy Galerie Buchholz, Berlin/Cologne. Not available.
About this Work
These work represent a direction that point to possibilities and creative opportunities Tillmans could pursue further.The abstractions are created by the direct manipulation of light on paper rather than through the camera.It’s only love, give it awayfrom 2005 is a lush and large piece from the “Freischwimmer (Free Floating)” series. Though non-representational, the image resembles skin and hair, and images from his other series of abstractions also retain a literal quality. Yet the slight literalness of the imagery anchors them within the context of his overall project. The abstractions are arresting and evocative; Tillmans could go much further on this promising route if he chooses.
About the Artist
Wolfgang Tillmans was born in Remscheid, Germany in 1968 and studied at Bournemouth & Poole College of Art and Design. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential artists of his generation. His work, whilst appearing to capture the immediacy of the moment and character of the subject, also examines the dynamics of photographic representation. From the outset he ignored the traditional separation of art exhibited in a gallery from images and ideas conveyed through other forms of publication, giving equal weight to both. His expansive floor to ceiling installations feature images of subcultures and political movements, as well as portraits, landscapes, still-lives and abstract imagery varying in scale from postcard- to wall-sized prints.
His earliest images were printed on digital copiers, and in the mid-1990s, living in London and then New York, Tillmans began to foreground the lo-fi properties of his printed images by exhibiting them pinned or taped to gallery walls. In 2005, at an exhibition at Maureen Paley gallery titledTruth Study Center, he further extended this approach by exhibiting photographs alongside newspaper cuttings, pamphlets and other kinds of printed matter, on custom-made wooden vitrines. This installation also brought to the fore more political themes in Tillmans’ photography. In 2011 he traveled to Haiti to document reconstruction efforts following the previous year’s earthquakes.
His work has been shown at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1996 and Tate Britain, London, in a major retrospective in 2003. He was awarded the Turner Prize in 2000.
