Eduardo Paolozzi Prints for Sale
Sir Eduardo Paolozzi KBE, FRA (1924-2005) was a sculptor, artist and print-maker regarded as the 'father of pop art'. He was born in Leith in north Edinburgh and studied at the Edinburgh College of Art in 1943, briefly at St Martin's School of Art and then at the Slade School of Fine Art in London. During his life, he worked in Paris, London and Munich producing a vast quantity of groundbreaking work. The artist died in London in April 2005. Paolozzi is one of our best-selling artists and his print prices continue to steadily increase.
Paolozzi in Paris
While in Paris, Paolozzi became acquainted with Alberto Giacometti, Jean Arp, Constantin Brancusi, Georges Braque and Fernand Léger. This period became an important influence for his later work.
Paolozzi in London
In 1950, he moved back to London eventually establishing his studio in Chelsea. The studio was a work-shop filled with hundreds of found objects, models, sculptures, materials, tools, toys and stacks of books. Paolozzi was interested in everything and would use a variety of objects and materials in his work, particularly his collages which he often took into print using lithography and screenprint methods. He was a highly original printmaker, some of whose collage-based silkscreened images are among the finest examples of Pop Art.
Together with Nigel Henderson he established Hammer Prints Limited, a design company producing wallpapers, textiles and ceramics that were initially manufactured at Landermere Wharf.
The Independent Group
In 1952, he set up the Independent Group, a group of artists and writers, including Richard Hamilton and William Turnbull who wanted to challenge modernist approaches to culture and explore theories of mass culture re-evaluating the concept of modernism. The Independent Group is regarded as the precursor to the mid 1950s British and late 1950s American Pop Art movements.
Graphic Work
Paolozzi’s graphic work of the 1960s was highly innovative, often experimenting with silkscreen. The resulting prints are characterised by Pop culture references and technological imagery as series of prints. As Is When (12 prints on the theme of Paolozzi’s interest in the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein; published as a limited edition of 65 by Editions Alecto, 1965); Moonstrips Empire News (100 prints, eight signed, in an acrylic box; published as a limited edition of 500 by Editions Alecto, 1967); Universal Electronic Vacuu (10 prints, poster and text; published by Paolozzi as a limited edition of 75, 1967); General Dynamic Fun. (part 2 of Moonstrips Empire News; 50 sheets plus title sheet; boxed in five versions; published as a limited edition of 350 by Editions Alecto, 1970). In 1971, he produced the BASH prints in many colourways as editions of 3000 giving more people access to his work than ever before. Printed at Advanced Graphics and published by Galerie Dorothea Leonhart, Munich, the imagery was taken from space technology, the periodic table, molecular models, anatomy of the heart, plug/lead telephone switchboard, with robots and idols of the time.
Paolozzi in Germany
Paolozzi had a long association with Germany, He was a professor at the Fachhochschule in Cologne from 1977 to 1981, and later taught sculpture at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Munich. Paolozzi had a studio in Munich where many of his works were developed, including the mosaics in the Tottenham Court Road Station in London.
In 1994, Paolozzi gave the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art a large body of his works, and much of the content of his studio. In 1999 the National Galleries of Scotland opened the Dean Gallery to display this collection, and includes a recreation of his studio, with its contents evoking the original London and Munich locations
