Jeppe Curth: 0:00

And welcome to the Collector's Edge from Nordic Art Partners. In this episode we will discuss the work and career of Heinz Mack, a distinctive artist known for his pioneering contribution to the abstraction at the midpoint of the 20th century, for his founding of the Zero Movement and his innovative exploration of light and color. With me today is, as usual, our art expert, nicholas Robertson, and me your host, Jeppe Curth. Let's get started.

Nicholas Robinson: 0:30

It is with Alex Rotter, at 400 million Selling, here at Christie's $400 million is the bid and the piece is sold. We've all heard about it. Sometimes it's front page news Important works of art are being sold for incredible sums of money. But can you get involved and become a part of the exclusive club yourself, and how do you get started while avoiding buying the wrong things? That's exactly what this podcast is about. This is the Collector's Edge from Nordic Art Partners, a podcast for those of you interested in the mechanics of the art industry, want advice about putting money into art, or simply want to buy something for your walls, to beautify your surroundings. Whatever your objectives, it is possible to put money into art wisely, to be considered, thoughtful and well-in informed in your choices and actions. Welcome to the art of collecting with an eye for curated beauty and practical value.

Jeppe Curth: 1:37

Hi Nick.

Nicholas Robinson: 1:38

Hi Jeppe, how are you doing? I am fine, thank you you. Yeah, I'm good, thank you I am fine.

Jeppe Curth: 1:43

Thank you you. Yeah, I'm good. Thank you, Nicholas Robison. A contemporary art expert with more than 25 years of experience. Nick has worked in London and was in New York for 20 years and more recently in Copenhagen. He has worked in the auction industry and was a gallerist in Manhattan for many years. For the last decade, he has focused on heavily resource-based acquisitions for his family portfolio for private high net worth clients, family offices and fine art investment funds. So today, Heinz Mack yes, Heinz Mack. Can we start by you walking us through Heinz Mack, beginning in the art world and his background?

Nicholas Robinson: 2:29

Yes, Heinz Mack is an interesting and in some ways a strange artist. He's one of these artists that you can mention his name to people and they will have something about him, perhaps lurking in the recesses of their mind, but they can't really put a finger on who he is, what he does, what he's noted for. Almost like there's not a particular hook that they're able to hang his work on, his, his work on um, at least in terms of what they associate him with Um. But Heinz Mack is truly one of the great pioneers of mid-century modernist and had a really seminal role in the explosion of different kinds of experimental contemporary art practices in the post-war period. He was born in 1931 and is still working today. He studied at the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf from 1950 until 1956. Um and then, at the end of this period, along with his uh student, uh colleague friend uh Otto Piener um he formed uh a movement, uh called the Zero Movement, which was joined shortly thereafter by a slightly more celebrated artist, günther Uecker.

Jeppe Curth: 4:11

Please elaborate a bit on that. What is the Zero Movement?

Nicholas Robinson: 4:18

Well, the Zero Movement. It was a loosely knit group of artists that emerged in Germany, initially formed by Mack and Piena whilst they were students, and called Zero. Rather like Ground, Zero is the sort of epicenter of a bomb or an explosion. Zero was considered to be the starting point, um, uh, you know, uh, a place of, of new beginnings. Um, uh, Otto Piena, um coined a phrase to describe it as a zone of silence and of pure possibilities for a new beginning. And uh, he and Mac um composed a poem. Um composed a poem that goes like this Zero is silence, Zero is the beginning, Zero is round, Zero spins, Zero is the moon, the sun is zero, Zero is white. The desert, zero. The sky above zero the night.

Nicholas Robinson: 5:26

So, obviously, that's a very, a very lyrical way of describing their objectives and obviously you know you, you could have a chuckle at that. I think it's quite profound and quite beautiful. But some of the main themes were really, to begin with, monochrome, because really it was the, the purest departure from the expressive gestural art that had um gained in primacy, uh, in both the european and north european art, north american artistic practices in the post-war period. And then, further to the emphasis on, on, on, on the monochrome, the spatial effects of color and how this main constituent component could be affected by things like light and vibration and movement focus on collaborative happenings, events, installations and many of the early cooperative exhibitions that the various artists were involved in involved self-curated group exhibitions, self-published catalogs, moving away from the cult of the artist as an individualist.

Nicholas Robinson: 6:44

So, as their theories spread, the zero movement was to become actually the most global art movement of the mid-20th century, ended up with active participants in many countries. So Heinz Mack was regarded amongst his peers as its leader, and the adherents included many of the great luminaries of this period, really legends of 20th century art. In France, notable participants were Yves Klein and Armand. In Switzerland, jean Tangley, the great kinetic sculptor. In Italy, lucio Fontana, piero Manzoni, enrico Castellani and even a group of artists in Japan that became very interested in these theories, especially Yayoi Kusama. So this, of course, is a sort of a who's who of the international avant-garde intelligentsia, with Mac at the epicenter as the founder and leader.

Jeppe Curth: 7:49

Thank you, nick. Very interesting so this zero movement and these specific themes. How does Heinz Mack explore this in his works and why do you think this resonates so powerful and well with the audience and the collectors?

Nicholas Robinson: 8:04

so powerful and well with the audience and the collectors. Well, I mean, I think Heinz is really not as well known as his achievements deserve, and I think that's for a few reasons. One, his practice was extremely diverse. So he was known as a sculptor. He made various installations. He made works with unusual materials modern and contemporary materials, different kinds of metals, acrylic, things that would enable light to be reflected and refracted in interesting ways. So he was very much interested in, so he was very much interested in, experimenting with the experiential effects of light and colour. I mean, he would describe himself as a sculptor and a painter.

Nicholas Robinson: 8:57

Most of his work sort of begins as a painter. In fact his first works from the late 1950s, 1957 really, they're monochromatic works that are predicated largely on an exploration of the grid and you know they explore registers of light and dark and a sort of oscillating movement that results optically from their juxtaposition. So you know he's become associated with minimalist art. That's sort of flowed from some of these explorations. He's been associated with kinetic art for the reasons I've just described. He's been associated with op art because of the sort of jangling vibrancy optically that his paintings have. So these are some of his achievements, or some of the sort of landmarks of his production, if you like.

Jeppe Curth: 9:54

Okay, and which of Heinz Mack's pieces would you consider like essential for understanding his impact?

Nicholas Robinson: 10:01

Well, he's had an extraordinarily long career. I mean, he was born in 1931 and he's still working today. Um, he lives in uh, mönchengladbach in Germany and also in Ibiza, where he keeps a studio as well. Um, but I would say his early paintings, his early black, white, grisaille paintingsille paintings, are beautiful, they're very graphic, but there's also, you know, clearly, the sort of hand of the artist in them.

Nicholas Robinson: 10:33

I think that his sculptural works made in the late 50s, all the way through the 1970s, I mean even till the present day, but I suppose the seminal examples you can pick out a few different bodies of work from the various periods, but sculptures with the sort of interesting textural surfaces that enable different effects of light as it hits the surface, and then a group of works that really are the works that have captivated our interest and our attention, are a recent body of works, by which I mean the last 20 years or so, um, that are called in English, uh, the chromatic constellations, and these are really a? Um, uh, well, both a distillation and a culmination of all of these um areas of study that he's been involved with for the entirety of his career. Um, so, so, yeah, yeah, the chromatic constellation. These are paintings on canvas and they are also somewhat premised on the grid, and these consist of contiguous blocks of colour and sort of often quite strange colours, if I may say, sort of dissonant colours or colours that would appear to be dissonant when arrayed alongside each other but create very interesting color harmonies.

Nicholas Robinson: 12:09

These blocks of color. They're very sort of rigid and ordered from a distance, but then when you scrutinize the painting more closely you see that these blocks are much more uneven, much more brushy, lots of washes of sort of dry color built up in glazes, and then the edges of these blocks they sort of overlap tones where the colors are of the two blocks are mixing together and they, they have this very um, yeah, they sort of hum a little bit, if that's not too strange a way to describe it. Um, so you have this really interesting, sophisticated, very beautiful approach to abstraction and to studies um of color and light and how these various constituent elements interact with each other.

Jeppe Curth: 13:17

Well, we have. We have bought Highz Mack Works for ourselves, but also when we advise clients about Heinz Mack Works, how do you place him within this current market trends and historical context?

Nicholas Robinson: 13:31

But his place in the market is very difficult to place, I have to say. And for me, for us, when we, when we look at an artist, um, you know, obviously we are, we're trying to understand the, the value of an artist, you know, and and by that I mean the sort of inherent, innate value of their, of their achievement, their contribution. We like to see how an artist fits into history, and not just where did they fit into history? It's, did they actively influence history and did they change the course of artistic production with the things that they were saying and doing? Um, and and obviously, for, for the case of Heinz Mack, that is a very uh, obviously, um, resonant, yes, um, so we can see that he's, he's, he's an artist of of of huge importance.

Nicholas Robinson: 14:39

And often when we look at artists, we try and understand how they were received at the sort of inception of their career. What was the critical reception like, what was the institutional reception like? But this has been going on so long for Heinz that it's really much more pertinent to say what has he not done, what has he not achieved? And the answer is really nothing. Germany, at the 1970 edition of the Venice Biennale, he's had 450 odd exhibitions worldwide since beginning of his career in the late 1950s. Um, he's, um, you know you. You ask what, what museums, uh, is is he in? I mean, there are no museums he's not in. I mean, he's in more than 150 institutions worldwide. So it's, there's a universal acclaim for Heinz Mack and yet, to go back to my opening comments, there are so many responses that range from yeah, heinz Mack, heinz Mack, to yeah, yeah, what you know what did he do again? And I think it's incredibly interesting to try, and you know, investigate that sort of phenomenon. Thank you, nick.

Jeppe Curth: 16:07

But what I also meant was what part of Heinz Mack's works do you find most appealing to collectors when considering them for acquisition? Is it the visual, is it the history, is it the data, or is it a mix of it?

Nicholas Robinson: 16:19

Well, of course it's a mix of all of those things. I mean, you can respond to something in a very visceral way, you can follow up on your curiosity and your enthusiasm, and you can yeah you can verify the information that I've just described about his very obvious credentials.

Nicholas Robinson: 16:42

Um, you know, we we take a look at the galleries that that show the work. We we try and understand what kind of availability is there, what kind of demand is there for the work, what kind of supplies there for the work? Um, I mean, heinz has has really nice galleries. He works with um uh uh, para and Romero in Madrid, which is a wonderful gallery. Um, he shows with Speroni Westwater in New York and, of course, they need no introduction he shows with Ben Brown in London, presumably in Hong Kong, where Ben also has exhibition spaces. Um, he shows with Nara Rosler in Brazil. Um, which also had a kind of interesting relationship with um the zero movement. So you know, he's, he's well represented um around the world with highly credible places that are very serious in the championing of their, of their artists. Um, so, yeah, uh, we we've got a lot of information that that gives us a lot of faith that uh, he's, he's well looked after.

Nicholas Robinson: 17:53

But, but, uh, but you know there's there's more to it than that. I mean, I I don't always get too hung up on, you know, if there's lots of people clamoring for the work if it's a highly inelastic supply and far too many people that want things. You know, sometimes the best things are hidden in plain sight sight. And you know there's just these strange historical accidents where the market has not really caught up to the art history. But invariably that's something that gets dismantled over time and changes. So you know, if there's people not knocking down the door for Heinz Mack paintings, that's fine, that's good. That means there's more interesting things, at least in the meantime, for us to be able to look at and choose from and acquire.

Jeppe Curth: 18:45

Yes, that makes sense. I believe that his record auction result is $3.5 million, for for a large sculpture and large-scale painting is around $900,000. Could you maybe share a little bit inside on the primary prices from galleries?

Nicholas Robinson: 19:10

Sure, I mean, I think that the works that you mentioned must have been works from the late 1950s. I mean, all of Heinz Mack's very biggest prices relate to the beginning of his sort of influential period. The paintings that I mentioned, the chromatic constellation paintings, which I think are extremely interesting things to look into, paintings which I think are extremely interesting things to look into. They, for a modest size picture, maybe 50, 60 centimeters you're looking at maybe 60 to $80,000. For a big two and a half three meter painting, you're looking at five or $600 thousand dollars, most likely. Um, if you want to buy a historic painting from the late 1950s, then you can, depending on the size and the quality. Um, you know, important early works can be acquired for anywhere from 350, 400 000 euros up to a million more or less. So this gives a bit of a guideline. There's some very nice works on paper from the late 1950s that aesthetically bear all the hallmarks that you would want, but the sort of hierarchy of the medium makes them pretty affordable. They can be anywhere from sort of 80 to $120,000. And they're extremely important historic works. Um, and I think, I think, when we, you know, when we, when you ask about sort of price. You know there's there's an artist's price relative to uh himself or herself, different periods of importance, different uh importance, different outputs they had made, which are maybe more or less popular and more or less expensive as a result. But I think we're also really interested in, when we look at an artist, we look at the cost of an artist's work relative to the industry as a whole. You know, how does an artist's price relate to the cost of the work of his or her peers? You know, if we buy work by this artist, you know what is the opportunity cost of that. What are we not able to buy instead, because we're committing resources to this artist and I think for me, heinz Mack's work is extremely, extremely affordable. Um, uh, and I think you know there's a couple of really, really nice anecdotes about Heinz Mack, uh and his early, early, early days, um, that to me are very instructive about his relative importance and these stories. They speak to his status and his reputation amongst his peers, and these stories were told to me actually by Guillermo in Madrid, who is an extremely eloquent advocate for Heinz's work. In any event, heinz, I think in the late 1950s or maybe the very early 1960s, was traveling to Paris and he was going to meet with Yves Klein, and when he visited Klein, Klein made a big sort of performative gesture of deference to Mac, the founder of Xero and, in Klein's view, this great master. So Klein gave up his bed so that Heinz Mac could sleep in it and then Klein slept on the floor alongside as a sort of a gesture of subservience and respect side, as a sort of a gesture of subservience and and respect. Um, and and the other fun, fun story that I enjoyed very much Um, when Mac had his first exhibition, a lot of the works in it were sculptural works and there was one piece that was sold.

Nicholas Robinson: 23:15

And this is, of course, not uncommon in in in an artist's, uh, the beginning of an artist's career, when nobody knows who they are or what they stand for or what they do, and you have to get a response and you have to get some momentum.

Nicholas Robinson: 23:28

Um, a couple of years later, mac was traveling to Italy where he was going to visit, uh, lucio Fontana. And so he goes into Fontana's studio and on Fontana's workbench he sees this sculpture. So he learns that his first ever patron, the first ever acquirer of Mac's work from a commercial context, was Lucio Fontana. So I mean, you look at, you look at these two artists' work and you see how sort of gigantic their reputation and their the prices of their works, and you, you hark back to these anecdotes and you think of the regard in which Mack was held by these guys, and then you see, you know what Heinz Mack's work costs in relation to their work, and you know, you know what Heinz Max work costs in relation to their work, and you know, rationally, it actually makes it actually makes no sense. Um, so, so, so, yeah, so, of course there's many contextual things that we take into account when we try and ascertain value and of course, there's a big sliding scale of criteria, um, uh, by which we, by which we assess value.

Jeppe Curth: 24:59

Well, Nick, from a putting money into art perspective, how do you see Heinz Mack's work fitting into a well-created art collection?

Nicholas Robinson: 25:04

I see Mack's work as sort of essential, definitive 20th century abstraction. I think that he is that key and that important. You know, when you look at the development of art in the 20th century, you know in the in the, the 20th century is characterized by lots of different movements that all have very kind of complicated theories, justifications, philosophies that explain what they do and why. But one of the key things of the 20th century is the sort of dichotomy between figuration and abstraction. And if you look at the abstraction trajectory, you know abstraction is primarily about the constituent components of a painting. What is a painting? It's line and color and form of some description on a flat surface, really sort of puritanically um, adherent to this and he did, did it in in really interesting, innovative ways. Um, he made his first black and white paintings in 1957. Um, and for contrast, it wasn't until 1959, fully two years later, that Frank Stella announced himself to the world, uh, in the museum of modern Art's 16 Americans exhibition, and it wasn't until 1960 that he exhibited works from this group in the first show at Castelli Gallery. So you know, these works represent the cornerstone of Stella's reputation and he, I suppose, is considered the absolute sort of master for innovating this at the midpoint of the 20th century. Yet it could so readily be argued that it was Mack who had already paved the way for such an achievement. So that's how key Mack is.

Nicholas Robinson: 27:01

And you know Mack as a German artist studying at the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf, he would have been well grounded in the sort of German intellectual color theorists of the earliest 20th century. I mean, if you look at the, if you look at the faculty at the Bauhaus, and you, you see the, you see the, the lessons, uh, the theories, um uh, elucidated by, um, by Kandinsky and Paul Clay, and then you see, you know, you fast forward 80 years to painters like Stanley Whitney, for instance, whose work also costs millions of dollars in some instances. Heinz Mack is literally and figuratively the bridge between, you know, these early um sort of protagonists of color theory, to, you know, to artists working today that have become enormously celebrated in the market, um. So, by any, by any criteria, any historic criteria, any, any uh achievements, criteria, any achievements, any critical appraisal achievements, mack is a titan of the art world, and so of course it follows, as far as we're concerned, that at some point a proper reckoning will take place whereby he's properly appreciated in the way that his work deserves.

Jeppe Curth: 28:30

So adding Heinz Mack to your collection today would be a smart acquisition and also something that's appreciated over time.

Nicholas Robinson: 28:43

But my opinion is, undoubtedly, my feeling is how can this not happen, given what we know and what I've just described? But you know, even further to that, the paintings are extremely reasonably priced and they are just sumptuous essays of light and color. And you know the, the, the, the, the, the purity of these works, the joy in these works, the quality of execution in these works, I mean, they're, they're, they're very, they're very rigid and programmatic, but there's also a great deal of levity and a great deal of expression, also within the sort of rule-based confines of the way that he evolves his paintings. So I mean, I just find them to be just outstanding, outstanding works unto themselves them to be just outstanding, outstanding works unto themselves.

Nicholas Robinson: 29:33

Okay, so could you maybe then summarize the key points to make a heinz mack work attractive addition to a collection yes, uh, I guess, um, if we distill the things that we've, we've learned and we've talked about um, he's, you know, a historic figure, uh, almost unrivaled if you sort of tick off the CV achievements.

Nicholas Robinson: 29:57

He's actually going to have a retrospective, I believe in 2025, beginning at the Philadelphia Art Museum, which is a fantastic museum and that hopefully will bring a new audience and new sets of eyes to his work, um, and, and you know, to, to, to give new appreciation to what he's managed to do. Um, so that's, you know, his, his museological reputation, institutional reputation, critical reputation, fantastic, still working, still exhibiting, um, uh, a litany of of great galleries around the world that represent the work. Um. You know, sometimes we get excited by artists when it's clear that a revival is already underway and we feel maybe vindicated by our choices. But sometimes we get excited when no revival is underway, no rumblings of such, and it's just feels opportune that, you know, it's sort of an open, open season for us to get involved in the work before, before it's too late, yes, and we are very happy with our acquisition of mac works.

Jeppe Curth: 31:06

But for people that maybe want to get started, where should they start exploring his works?

Nicholas Robinson: 31:12

well, I mean his works everywhere, even if you don't realize it. We were in in a small museum in olborg in northern jutland, um just a couple of weeks ago and amongst all the local artists that, with all due respect, nobody anywhere has ever heard of um, there were three or four Heinz Mack paintings, sort of strangely plonked in the middle of this mid-century section, um. So I mean you can go to any museum uh that has you know that purports to have a survey of 20th century works, and you'll find his work. Um. Obviously there's there's many sources that one can look at online. I mentioned his, his galleries. They all have really nice biographical information, really nice images that um show typical works of his Um.

Nicholas Robinson: 32:01

He has a website himself which is a really nice historic archive. Um as well. I believe the zero art movement has a foundation, and so you can see more about his work there, also how his work relates to his, his peers um globally from this very important period in the 20th century. Um. It's not difficult to learn a lot about him, and in the course of doing so it becomes astounding that he's not in fact a household name like basically all of his peers.

Jeppe Curth: 32:43

Thank you, Nick. So I think we are in the end of this episode. Do you have anything more to add?

Nicholas Robinson: 32:54

No, I mean, that's my homage to Mac. I'm very passionate about his work and I really, really urge people to go and take a look at it.

Jeppe Curth: 33:05

Great. Thank you, and if you have any questions or you maybe just want to buy some art, you can always catch us on our email at jeppe at nordicartpartnerscom. And thank you, Nick, for this episode.

Nicholas Robinson: 33:18

Thank you, jeppe. Yes, bye, bye.