New Overpainted Photographs
Opening Friday, February 5, 2010, Wako Works of Art is very pleased to present an exhibition of close to 30 new and recent overpainted photographs by Gerhard Richter.
For nearly half a decade, Richter has been producing his painting series, such as “Photo Paintings”, “Color Charts”, “Mirror Paintings”, and “Abstract Paintings”, as well as his photo archive Atlas and sculptural works employing mirrors and layers of high reflective glass. Placed within the often problematic context of postwar European art, Richter is recognized as one of the most significant figures today, and continues to pursue the “possibility of painting” beyond various boundaries. This “Overpainted Photograph” series, now consisting of nearly 600 snapshots taken by Richter himself and later overlaid with oil, acrylic, or enamel, address many of his concerns, from the relationship between painting and photography, to the blurring between the abstract and the figurative.
A new book on Richter’s Atlas project will be published in conjunction with this exhibition. The publication will feature selections from the artist’s journal and interviews, Japanese translation of Benjamin H.D. Buchloh’s “Gerhard Richter’s Atlas: The Anomic Archive”, and essay by Sumi Hayashi, curator at Kawamura Memorial Museum, all relevant to a finer understanding of the project. Designed by Daishiro Mori, this book will also be the first of a new text series to be published by the gallery. (In Japanese only)
Gerhard Richter
Gerhard Richter was born in Dresden in 1932 and educated at Dresden Art Academy, and later at Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf following his flee from the Communist East Germany. Richter had his first solo exhibition in 1964 in Düsseldorf, Munich, and Berlin; by the early 1970s, Richter exhibited frequently throughout Europe and the United States, and was first included in the Venice Biennale in 1974. He has received numerous artistic awards and recognitions, such as the Golden Lion at the 47th Venice Biennale and the Praemium Imperiale in 1997. He has had major retrospectives at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (2002), K20 Museum in Dusseldorf (2005), and more familiarly in 2005, with an exhibition that toured Kanazawa 21st Century Museum and Kawamura Memorial Museum of Art. His recent solo exhibitions include Gerhard Richter Portraits National Portrait Gallery, London; Overpainted Photographs, which traveled from Museum Morsbroich, Leverkusen, Centre de la Photographie Genève, and Fundacion Telefonica, Madrid.