Konrad Klapheck (born February 10, 1935) is a German painter and graphic artist whose style of painting combines features of

Surrealism Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

and Pop art. He was born in

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in ...

. From 1954 to 1956 he studied painting under Bruno Goller at the

Kunstakademie Düsseldorf The Kunstakademie Düsseldorf is the academy of fine arts of the state of North Rhine Westphalia at the city of Düsseldorf, Germany. Notable artists who studied or taught at the academy include Joseph Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Magdalena Jetelová ...

.Grove Art Online. Klapheck's works of the mid-1950s are in a magic realist style that became more idiosyncratic when he painted the first of his

typewriter A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...

s. His subsequent paintings, often large in scale, are precise and seemingly realistic depictions of technical equipment, machinery and everyday objects, but strangely alienated; they are "monumental, amusingly absurd and sexually suggestive".Johnson 1994. Klapheck's subjects through the years have included (in order of introduction) typewriters, sewing machines, water taps and showers, telephones, irons, shoes, keys, saws, car tires, bicycle bells and clocks. Influenced by

Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...

Man Ray Man Ray (born Emmanuel Radnitzky; August 27, 1890 – November 18, 1976) was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in Paris. He was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealism, Surrealist movements, although his t ...

, and

Max Ernst Max Ernst (2 April 1891 – 1 April 1976) was a German (naturalised American in 1948 and French in 1958) painter, sculptor, printmaker, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was a primary pioneer of the Dada movement and Surrealis ...

, Klapheck's "ironic treatment of everyday mechanics" prefigures Pop art in its magnification of the trivial. He was also close to French

and

André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first '' Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') ...

wrote his last published text about a Klapheck's exhibition at Galerie Sonnabend in 1965. Between 1992 and 2002, he has painted friends, colleagues, and celebrities from the international art scene. He became a professor at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in 1979.

Notes

References

*Grove Art Online *

External links

Konrad Klapheck on Artcyclopedia
1935 births German artists Living people Academic staff of Kunstakademie Düsseldorf Kunstakademie Düsseldorf alumni {{Germany-artist-stub