UNTITLED (GRIFFELKUNST),1989

Yesterday German painter Sigmar Polke died at the age of 69. Polke, whose output did not slow in spite of a battle with cancer, was the practicioner of large-scale works whose interest in cartoon and mass media was once called Capitalist Realism in Germany, and whose intensely varied marks yielded a lifelong inventiveness with form and media.

"No artist of our time, and certainly no artist working on painting, is more significant than Sigmar Polke."—Caroll Dunham, artist