Die Arche / The Ark

Artist Karl Hartung was among the pioneers of abstract sculpture in Germany. By 1935, he had already begun to work with an increasingly organic abstract formal language, aiming to depict the constant transformation and metamorphosis of all living things. As such, the title The Ark is only an association that may arise from the sculpture’s abstract cross shape.
The basic form of a cross is transformed into a three-dimensional, gently flowing structure with openings and bulges that look like they grew there naturally, like a crystal or rock formation. In his work, the artist was not concerned with the figure or the pure form, but with the visualization of a creative principle in itself, with The Ark as a symbol of it.