This volume, which includes German and English versions of all text, includes the following essays: Margret Schütte’s “‘I liked the life. That came first.’ CY TWOMBLY” ; Jürgen Fitschen’s “Bildverlust—Über die Fotografie Cy Twomblys” (“Image loss—About the photography of Cy Twombly”); and an excerpt from the exhibition foreword. It also includes reproductions of photographs, prints, and works on paper, as well as a biography of the artist. 

Schütte opens with a characterization of Twombly’s photographs as “[a] work between reduction and opulence, painting, drawing, graphics, sculpture and photography; soft and sensuous or raw and at first glance clumsy” (11). She describes Twombly’s early education and influences, emphasizing the impact of figures such as Robert Motherwell. She offers a thorough overview of Twombly’s biography and characterizes his photographs as “show[ing] nature sporadically and monumentalised and the fullness of nature in individual objects” (13).

Fitschen emphasizes the influence of Black Mountain College on the totality of Twombly’s photographic oeuvre and identifies two key characteristics of the photographs: first, that “his photos are always fuzzy. The fuzziness characterises a lack; namely a lack of sufficient sharpness” (19), and second, that “many of Twombly’s photos are overexposed…The artificial light is either directed at individual motifs—making them appear to be transformed by the light, or they shine as cold as neon light—or it spreads out in the room where the photo is being taken” (19). He queries the relationship between reality and the image, drawing on theorists such as Carlos Castaneda and Claude Lévi-Strauss. 

For more on Twombly’s photographs, see also From State of Mind to the Tangible: The Photographic Cosmos of Cy Twombly by Carlos Peris (2022); Cy Twombly: Photographs, Volume II, published by Gagosian (2015); Cy Twombly: Photographs 1951–2007, ed. Laszlo Glozer (2008); Twombly: Photographs, published by Brazos Projects (2000); Cy Twombly Photographs: Lyrical Variations, published by the Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art (2016); Cy Twombly: Photographs, published by Matthew Marks Gallery (1993); Cy Twombly: A Survey of Photographs 1954–2011, published by Gagosian Gallery (2012); and Cy Twombly: Photographs, 1951–1999, ed. Nicola Del Roscio (2002). 

(Publication description by Jamie Danis)

Published on the occasion of the exhibition Cy Twombly. Photographien, Druckgraphiken und Papierarbeiten aus der Sammlung Großhaus / Photographs, prints and works on paper from the Grosshaus collection, May 28 – October 16, 2011.

Cy Twombly. Photographs, prints and works on paper from the Grosshaus Collection. Introduction by Margaret Schütte. Text by Jürgen Fitschen. Published by Landesmuseen Gottorf, Schleswig, 2011. 216 pages, fully illustrated. English/German edition.