Internationalist Mashup Artist Sigmar Polke

It's always nice to come across a mashup artist, such as the late German Sigmar Polke, who did much more, but also infused some of his photography and paintings with splashes of color, chemicals, letting chance run its course for the sake of not so coincidental happenstance art.

Way before computer photoediting, Polke, who died in 2010, was a DIY, using his own photography as raw material, to be manipulated, replaned, giving supra-dimensions to stills he shot with his 35mm Leica. His art clearly shows that dreariness / dreaminess always have their diametrically-opposed flip side.

Some of this work resulted from far-ranging trips in the 1970s, from Afghanistan, to Brazil, Pakistan, the United States, and France. It was not always innocent or too distant work, since some of his photography focused on opium dens, like in Pakistan.

Some of Polke's work is currently on display in New York City at the MoMa, which is why he's also in the news, and getting well-deserved accolades.