Artist Database

Helmut Starke was born in West Germany in 1935. He completed an apprenticeship at the Werbekunst Publicity Studio, Frankfurt and went on to work as a graphic designer for J Walter Thompson, Frankfurt. Starke then moved to Cape Town to work at P N Barrett Advertising and Lindsay Smithers (Cape) Pty Advertising. In 1973, he was appointed as a full-time lecturer in Graphic Design at the University of Cape Town's Michaelis School of Fine Art. Starke participated in numerous solo and group shows; most notably in the 1964 and 1966 Venice Biennale and the 1963 Sao Paolo Biennale.

Starke often used his art to critique social and political issues, drawing inspiration from Pop Art-particularly artists like Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein-as well as from Photorealism and Surrealism. He experimented with visual ambiguities by merging two environments within a single picture plane and manipulating light and color to transcend the objectivity of the photographic source images.