Lot 3479 - A215 Post-War & Contemporary - Thursday, 27. November 2025, 02.00 PM
JEAN TINGUELY
(Fribourg 1925–1991 Bern)
Untitled. 1990.
Iron, buffalo skull, sandstone, wood, plastic container, electric motor.
192 × 100 × 120 cm.
Provenance:
- Dubinsky Fine Arts, Zurich.
- Private collection, Switzerland, acquired from the above in 1995.
Our own transience and that of all life are themes that have preoccupied artists again and again since time immemorial. While even in Ancient Rome the Stoic Seneca was keenly aware of the imminence of death, the concept flourished again during the Baroque period with the omnipresent maxim of ‘memento mori’. Extinguished candles, wilting flowers, hourglasses and skulls - the repertoire of vanitas motifs was diverse and rich in meaning.
In his kinetic sculpture of the 1990s, Jean Tinguely utilised several of these highly charged objects: in addition to the heavy millstone and the dramatic-looking vase of funeral flowers, it is the monumental buffalo skull in particular that sets the scene. The large-format work marries archaic materials with mechanical movement, and the combination of organic remains, man-made iron construction and electrical energy evokes a sense of tension laden with metaphor.
The electric motor breathes a ghostly vitality into the sculpture; the skull swings up and down as if in a final revolt against the slow attrition of the millstone of life and finally death. In this work, Tinguely succeeds not only in formally linking death and technology, but also in imbuing them with existential significance: the sculpture seems as if it were a kinetic echo from an intermediate world, a visual meditation on the end and, at the same time, a reflection on being and continuing. For one thing must not be forgotten: the maxim of ‘memento mori’ was never merely concerned with the commemoration of transience but was also in fact an exhortation to the conscious enjoyment of life, to being mindful of the time we have been given.
With its powerful presence and complex semantics, this work is a rare example of Tinguely's ability to unite symbolic depth with mechanical poetry - a work of art of exceptional intensity and expressiveness.
In his kinetic sculpture of the 1990s, Jean Tinguely utilised several of these highly charged objects: in addition to the heavy millstone and the dramatic-looking vase of funeral flowers, it is the monumental buffalo skull in particular that sets the scene. The large-format work marries archaic materials with mechanical movement, and the combination of organic remains, man-made iron construction and electrical energy evokes a sense of tension laden with metaphor.
The electric motor breathes a ghostly vitality into the sculpture; the skull swings up and down as if in a final revolt against the slow attrition of the millstone of life and finally death. In this work, Tinguely succeeds not only in formally linking death and technology, but also in imbuing them with existential significance: the sculpture seems as if it were a kinetic echo from an intermediate world, a visual meditation on the end and, at the same time, a reflection on being and continuing. For one thing must not be forgotten: the maxim of ‘memento mori’ was never merely concerned with the commemoration of transience but was also in fact an exhortation to the conscious enjoyment of life, to being mindful of the time we have been given.
With its powerful presence and complex semantics, this work is a rare example of Tinguely's ability to unite symbolic depth with mechanical poetry - a work of art of exceptional intensity and expressiveness.
CHF 60 000 / 80 000 | (€ 61 860 / 82 470)
Sold for CHF 75 000 (including buyer’s premium)
All information is subject to change.