Klapheck, who was just 10 when World War II ended, saw in the destroyed cities and ruined buildings all around him a certain beauty or spectacle. After becoming a student at the Düsseldorf Art Academy, Klapheck turned to a different kind of subject matter, creating the first of his many “machine pictures”: the 1955 painting Typewriter. He went on to expand his repertoire to include sewing machines, faucets, telephones, irons, and even a hay-turning machine.