"Untitled (Double Object)", 1979

two felt sheets, two metal clips

felt, each 30,1 x 22,4 x 1 cm (11 7/8 x 8 7/8 x 3/8 in.)

inscribed on the left clip 'Joseph', on the right clip 'Beuys'

About the work

Felt as a working material had an important place in Beuys' oeuvre. The artist had woven a legend around felt. He said that in World War II, he had crashed on the Crimean peninsula in a snowstorm with the JU 87, on which he was a gunner, on March 16, 1944. Seriously wounded, he had been tended to by Crimean Tartars, who had rubbed him with fat and wrapped him in felt against the cold. In the present double object, Beuys combines the felt with metal to form a kind of sculptural power station. The felt sheets function as accumulators of warmth and energy; the metal clips are the transmitters.