Anselm Kiefer

Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945) 

Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945) is one of the canonical artists of post-war Germany. His art provides an index of the sensitivities that have shaped his home country over the course of his lifetime. Along with the likes of Gerhard Richter and Georg Baselitz, Kiefer’s work has used figurative imagery to address issues vital to the history and cultural politics of Germany and of humanity in the widest sense. He won international recognition following his inclusion in A New Spirit in Painting (1981), a group exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London which summarised the latest developments in art and argued that painting — after an extended period in which conceptual art predominated — was again at the forefront of the avant-garde. His imagery often hums with mysticism: a metropolis photographed from the air; deep barrel vaults receding to infinity; mortified bodies caught in strange circumstances. The palpable, unconventional materials of his tableaux have sculptural quality, and he has routinely realised his desired images in both two- and three-dimensional formats. The variety of his chosen materials and formats complements his appetite for wide-ranging themes, which among many others have included poetry, ancient history, mythology, Christianity, and the legacy of National Socialism.