About the Work
Thomas Bayrle, one of the protagonists of 1960s art, embraced mass-produced industrial goods as the subject of his work. “At that time I was fascinated by them but, on the other hand, also baffled. It was crazy, how they were rolling stuff out in that kind of a canning factory. Ding, ding, ding...” The work was originally a commission piece for an advertising agency and refers to post-war Germany’s Economic Miracle: 4,200 cans represent the promise of happiness offered by condensed milk in real coffee – not the ersatz coffee of the war years. Despite the playfully absurd repetition, each part remains distinct, like the interlinking individual threads from which a cloth is made. Indeed, Bayrle, who trained as a weaver, sees the world as an expanse that is held together like a woven fabric.
