Marcel's Salvation
In an ode to Dadaist icon Marcel Duchamp, Jorg Immendorff paints an art hero’s Valhalla. In a living-room-cum-art studio-cum-club, he gives the illusion of theatrical space. Images within images, he builds an architecture through the placement of paintings throughout the room, confusing masterpiece with reality.
Towards the back of the scene lies a brighter framed image: this is no ordinary lounge, but a private celebrity chamber of Café Deutschland. Figured with his favourite cigars and chessboard, and tuxedoed waiter bringing tipple, Duchamp accepts a light from the always hatted Joseph Beuys.
Seeming to wallow in his own chain-smoking reclusiveness, Jorg Immendorff renders Duchamp as a rat-packish figure from another era. High class tinged with sadness, he cuts through with an energetic doodle of slapstick zaniness.
