Abstract painting no. 424

Regarded today as one of the world’s foremost contemporary painters, Gerhard Richter has been exploring his chosen medium for more than fifty years. He was born in Dresden, although his parents relocated to the countryside not long after his birth, meaning that he and his family escaped the dangers and privations experienced under the Nazi regime.  After studying at the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf, Richter became a distinguished teacher, informing an entire generation of German artists.

Throughout his career Richter has explored the intersection between painting and photography, developing a type of hybrid methodology. This painting comes from a series of works simply titled Abstract paintings, created over a two-year period. In a complex three-step process, Richter initially painted an intimate-scale oil on canvas, which he then photographed. Using an epidiascope, this image was projected onto a much larger canvas and then (re)painted by Richter. This time-consuming and laborious process results in a soft, almost ethereal, painting, one that bridges the distinct media of painting and photography. Simultaneously hyperreal and abstracted, sharp and out of focus, masculine and feminine, this photo-painting is a paradox; it also cleverly demonstrates the synergies the artist has developed between these seemingly conflicting media.

Tansy Curtin, Curator, International Art pre–1980