Portraits and nature pieces II

They are back! After the paintings “Johanna I” (1983/84) and “Silvia I” (1998) as well as the woodcut “Rüschegg” (1988/89) travelled to the exhibitions at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (DK) and the Deichtorhallen Hamburg (D), we are delighted to be able to show them again.

In the first room, the four Gräser (Grasses) paintings from the 1990s are displayed, with which Gertsch resumed painting after a several-year break during which he exclusively developed his new woodcut technique. Gertsch pursued a conceptual approach to his own painting in this series, by photographing details from his own first painting and using them as templates for the other ones, and by playing with sections and exposures. The young girl Silvia appears in between the grass paintings like a figure from earlier times.

In the second room, the portrait “Johanna I” is exhibited alongside large-format Schwarzwasser woodcuts and the landscape “Rüschegg”. In the mid-1980s, Gertsch developed his own type of large-format coloured woodcut that differed from his early ventures in this technique in several essential points. While he retained this technique’s classic black linearity in his first woodcuts and worked with a system of black contours, the later woodcuts are characterized by a system of so-called ‘light points’—the depiction of the motif results from the interaction of the print’s bright spots.

Other paintings and woodcuts by the artist are exhibited in the extension building.

The exhibition was curated by Anna Wesle.

To the artist's website