Sigmar Polke's Late Works at Musée de Grenoble

The Musée de Grenoble presents an exhibition focused on the last twenty-five years of Sigmar Polke's career, running until February 2, 2014. Unlike comprehensive retrospectives elsewhere, this show highlights rarely seen late works, including sketchbooks, translucent pieces, and thermosensitive paintings that change with light and humidity. Polke (1941–2010) is less known in France compared to Richter, Baselitz, or Kiefer, despite his corrosive humor and self-derision. The exhibition features his signature Rasterbilder (raster paintings), where reproduction errors and impurities become artistic mutations. Curator Guy Tosatto opens with "Mains," a painting of figures hiding their eyes, setting the tone for a questioning of vision and certainty. Polke's use of toxic materials and alchemical experiments underscores his rejection of a harmless art. The show includes works on paper and large-format paintings, demonstrating his continuous metamorphosis and debt to informal tradition via his teacher Karl Otto Götz. A MoMA retrospective is planned for April 2014.