Il Greeting - Casa e spirale sotto la pioggia

About a lithograph of 1962

27. May 2021
Freshly found labyrinth, poster for Gallery H. Kamer, Paris
Already in his first lithograph, a poster of 1957, Hundertwasser reveals his intentions in graphic art: the close collaboration of the artist with the printer and the ultimate objective of every printed specimen differing from the other within an edition. 
Although the individual specimens of the following graphic print are not yet as individually different as the leaves of a tree, the history of their origins is remarkable:
In November and December 1962 Hundertwasser drew HOUSE AND SPIRAL IN THE RAIN directly on the stone at Cardazzo’s workshop in San Silvestro. The print was meant as a New Year’s greeting for clients of the Galleria del Cavallino at San Marco in Venice, which was run by Renato Cardazzo.
House and especially the spiral are the artist’s favourite themes: 
“The spiral is the symbol of life and death. The spiral lies at that very point where inanimate matter is transformed into life. (…)
My spiral grows and dies like a plant - the lines of the spiral, like a meandering river, follow the laws of growth of a plant. I let it take its own course and go along with it. In this way I make no mistakes.”
 (from: Hundertwasser, The Spiral, 1974)
Walter Koschatzky, author of the work catalogue of Hundertwasser’s original graphic prints, explained: “Now hedges, squares, lights were to provide new emphases. The time of the pure spiral was on the wane.”
The edition consists of 102 specimen. It is a rarity at art auctions.