Yves Klein- A Man In Blue

PR 1,Portrait Relief of Arman,1962

For an entire generation of young artists who had been confronted with the appalling possibility of atomic catastrophe,embodied in the photographs of Hiroshima that shocked the world,a new awareness of life-supporting energies had become imperative.It was no longer enough to come to terms with artistic tradition;the future had insinuated itself into artists' lives with an immediate and unparalled poignancy.To many,a utopian leap seemed the only way to break with the past,in the hope that someday,somewhere,they would be able to breathe free.
Shortly before his death,Yves Klein entrusted these thoughts to his journal:Now I want to go beyond art- beyond sensibility- beyond life.
I want to enter the void.My life should be like my symphony of 1949, a continuous note,liberated from begining to end......
.Excerpt from KLEIN by Hannah Weitemeier