german pop art

Untitled, Heavy Burschi with Warhol, c.1989-90 Art Print
Kippenberger, Martin
19.75 in. x 25.5 in.

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Martin Kippenberger

Martin Kippenberger (25 February 1953 in Dortmund – 7 March 1997 in Vienna) was a German artist known for his extremely prolific output in a dizzying range of styles and media as well as his provocative, jocular and hard-drinking public persona. During the last 10 years of his life he created a series of drawings on hotel stationery, which are commonly referred to as the ‘hotel drawings’. He died at age 44 from liver cancer.

Kippenberger was “widely regarded as one of the most talented German artists of his generation,” according to Roberta Smith of the New York Times. He was at the center of a generation of German enfants terribles including Albert Oehlen, Markus Oehlen, Werner Büttner, Georg Herold[2], Dieter Göls, and Günther Förg. He collected and commissioned work by many of his peers: some of his exhibition posters were designed by such prominent artists as Jeff Koons, Christopher Wool, Rosemarie Trockel and Mike Kelley.

His art garnered some recognition in the mid-nineties when three pieces were used by Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers as the cover artwork on the three singles released from their third album, The Holy Bible, in 1994: part four of the five-part Fliegender Tanga (“Flying Tanga”), which would be sold for £2,561,250 in 2010[4], was used for the first single “Faster/P.C.P.”; a 1983 piece, Sympatische Kommunistin (“Nice Communist Woman”), appeared on part one of the two-part single “Revol”; and, Titten, Türme, Tortellini (“Tits, Towers, Tortellini”), credited under its French title ” Des tètons(sic), des tours, des tortellini”, was the cover artwork on both parts of the two-part, third single “She Is Suffering”.

Kippenberger’s artistic reputation and influence has grown since his death. He has been the subject of a several large retrospective exhibitions, including at the Tate Modern in 2006 and “the Problem Perspective” at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, in 2008; the exhibition traveled to the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 2009.

In 2008 his sculpture of a toad being crucified called Zuerst die Füsse (“First the Feet”) was allegedly condemned by Pope Benedict as blasphemous.