Cover from Memory of the Skin
Klaus Rinke
German, born 1939
1987
A book cover from an illustrated volume rendered in faint pencil, where Rinke treats the surface like skin—preserving smudges and a quiet oval framing to evoke touch and memory.
You'd be struck by the pale, skin‑colored ground mottled with dusty, fingerprint‑like smudges and a barely visible pencil oval that feels like an imprint of a body's absence.
By turning a book cover into a record of touch and time, Rinke links drawing to bodily memory and helped extend late‑20th‑century conceptual art into intimate, material investigations of perception and the human body.
Medium
One from an illustrated book with thirteen pencil drawings (including front cover and broadside announcement)
Dimensions
composition (irreg.): 14 1/2 × 11 3/8" (36.9 × 28.9 cm); overall (closed): 16 7/16 × 12 3/8 × 13/16" (41.7 × 31.4 × 2 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Purchase
Accession
205.1988.12
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
