About Hundertwasser's spiral (excerpt)

Pierre Restany

The spiral existed long before Hundertwasser. But it had no importance in the history of art at the precise moment in which he gained his reputation as a painter. It was considered then as a mythological, decorative, or geometric element.



His spiral is organic, biological, and vegetative. (...)



This organic spiral denounces the atheism of the straight line and its fundamental non-creativity. The straight line is about to be unmasked by the vegetative spiral. (...)


The latest victory of the spiral over the straight line is the law of growth of crystals. Microscopic examinations have revealed that crystals are formed by successive spiraloid stratifications, like winding staircases. The spiral growth of crystals is the living proof that the straight line does not exist in nature.

 

Published in:

Restany, Pierre: Happy Hundertwasser - Hundertwasser Heureux. New York: Ballantine Books, 1978, pp. 25-27
Hundertwasser. New York: Parkstone Press International, 2008, pp. 49-50