Buy directly from the artist. End of broadcast: TV test pattern reimagined – order and color fields. Christof Hintze print. Blue in a Square - 250 plus artworks collection.
Buy directly from the artist. End of broadcast: TV test pattern reimagined – order and color fields. Christof Hintze print. Blue in a Square - 250 plus artworks collection.

SIGN OFF

SIGN OFF ref­er­ences the iconic test pat­tern of the analog tele­vi­sion era. A tech­ni­cal symbol of sign-off, trans­formed into a graph­ic work of art. In cool shades of blue, the func­tion­al grid becomes an abstract­ed image between retro tech­nol­o­gy and pop art. It recalls a time before non­stop broad­cast­ing, of pauses, static, and the moment of switch­ing off. SIGN OFF is part of the Blue in a Square art series fea­tur­ing 250+ artworks.

In the Static of the Deep.

Hard to imag­ine today: back then there were only three TV chan­nels. They went off the air around mid­night and came back on in the late morn­ing. If you fell asleep in front of the set, you were woken by Germany’s nation­al anthem at sign-off, by static, or by a test tone. There was plenty of time to step away from the screen—simply because there was noth­ing on. In ret­ro­spect, it was a valu­able time, per­haps the most precious.

We had no idea what 24-hour pro­gram­ming across 500+ channels—plus the inter­net, social media, and streaming—would mean. We thought it would be a par­adise of enter­tain­ment. From today’s per­spec­tive, we were truly naïve.

The art­work “Sign-Off” there­fore doesn’t res­onate equal­ly with every­one. For those who remem­ber it fondly, it is both a wit­ness and a piece of con­tem­po­rary history.

This piece can be pro­duced in custom sizes and edi­tions. It is avail­able exclu­sive­ly online via this art store. Just send an inquiry—we’ll be happy to pro­vide a tai­lored quote.

Canon Fine-Art inkjet print on pre­mi­um Hah­nemüh­le Photo Rag 308 gsm paper. Art­work size freely selec­table: from at least 20 × 20 cm up to 120 × 120 cm. Mount­ed on 2 mm alu­minum Dibond with a white wooden shadow-gap frame. Pricing/quote on request, depend­ing on size and quantity.

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