Apparatus used for impregnating the air with a picture. The picture is whirled through the air on a cord

This is one of the images from Sigmar Polke's "Higher Beings Ordain…" portfolio, a work in which the artist appropriates the format of scientific portfolios in its typography, staged photographs, and table of contents. The portfolio begins with a group of photographs in which Polke manipulated common household objects into the shape of a palm tree. In doing so, he mocked the postwar German middle-class taste for these exotic house plants during the 1950s and 60s. The artist then added four drawings to each portfolio so that each is simultaneously the same since it is one of 50, but also unique because of the added drawings. The witty title also makes fun of UFOs, suggesting that alien beings command Polke's creative acts, as if by remote control. The satirical nature of the portfolio speaks to Polke's critical view of Germany's post-war consumerism and the "genius" of the artist at work.