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Lot Essay
‘Three primary colours, as the source of endless sequences of tones… The shades and forms emerge through the constant blending of brushstrokes; they create an illusionistic space, without any need for me to invent forms or signs’
–Gerhard Richter
‘Richter succeeded in taking the inpaintings to a threshold where they exist – period. There are no underlying or overriding themes, no justifications, hierarchies, or declamations. It is nearly impossible, for example, to designate the red-blue-yellow inpaintings as colour paintings or depictions of colour; they possess, at best, an indifferent colourfulness. The title Rot-Blau- Gelb is thus a tease – less a traditional label than a list of the ingredients used in the act of painting. Yet out of this denial of every traditional semiotic and aesthetic component of the medium grew a brilliant high-quality painting’
–Dietmar Elger
Painted in 1973, Rot-Blau-Gelb (Red-Blue-Yellow) is situated at the dawn of Gerhard Richter’s abstract practice, probing the liminal threshold between reality and representation that lies at the heart of his oeuvre. Across the work’s surface, the three primary colours dissolved into vaporous wisps of swirling elemental hues. Turbulent swathes of paint in burnished ochre, russet and umber intermingle with luminous accents of amber to form smouldering sfumato layers. Part of the series of Rot-Blau-Gelb inpaintings that Richter completed between 1972 and 1973, the work represents a compelling juncture between the twin aesthetics of photorealism and abstraction that have defined his career. A gestural extension of the Colour Charts and monochromatic Grau (Grey) paintings of 1972 to 1976, it represents an important chapter in his journey towards the Abstraktes Bilder, which he would commence just four years later. Despite enveloping the viewer in an illusionistic space, the abstract compositional surface of the painting is devoid of any figurative content. At the same time, however, the work’s palette tantalisingly evokes the Annunciation after Titian series, executed the same year, in which glimmers of tangible reality lurk seductively beneath the blurred swathes of paint. Shortly after its creation, the work was included in Richter’s solo exhibition at the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus in Munich. It has since featured in a number of important shows, including Richter’s 2009 retrospective at the Albertina, Vienna, and his major touring retrospective Panorama at the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin in 2012.
Richter’s desire to create a new, autonomous existence for painting led to an increased fascination with the optical effects of colour. Inspired by his work on the non-representational Colour Charts and Grey paintings, in 1972 Richter developed a series of Vermalung or ‘inpaintings’. Initially painted in an exclusively grey palette, Richter quickly expanded his chromatic scheme to the three primary colours, bringing to life the Rot-Blau-Gelb series. In these works Richter further explored ways in which to undermine the representational responsibility of colour, seeking new means to separate it from traditional descriptive or symbolic functions. Though gestural, the work is resolutely inexpressive: the movement of paint over the canvas is indifferent, merely a means to an end. With entropic inevitability the three primaries transform into a universal palette, blending and merging of their own accord. ‘Always uneasy about exposing subjective decisions in his work’, writes Dietmar Elger, ‘Richter succeeded in taking the inpaintings to a threshold where they exist – period. There are no underlying or overriding themes, no justifications, hierarchies, or declamations. It is nearly impossible, for example, to designate the red-blue-yellow inpaintings as colour paintings or depictions of colour; they possess, at best, an indifferent colourfulness. The title Rot-Blau-Gelb is thus a tease – less a traditional label than a list of the ingredients used in the act of painting. Yet out of this denial of every traditional semiotic and aesthetic component of the medium grew a brilliant high-quality painting’ (D. Elger, Gerhard Richter: A Life in Painting, Cologne 2002, pp. 211-214). It was this objective levelling of composition, colour and chance that would ultimately pave the way for Richter’s later use of the squeegee in his Abstraktes Bilder.
–Gerhard Richter
‘Richter succeeded in taking the inpaintings to a threshold where they exist – period. There are no underlying or overriding themes, no justifications, hierarchies, or declamations. It is nearly impossible, for example, to designate the red-blue-yellow inpaintings as colour paintings or depictions of colour; they possess, at best, an indifferent colourfulness. The title Rot-Blau- Gelb is thus a tease – less a traditional label than a list of the ingredients used in the act of painting. Yet out of this denial of every traditional semiotic and aesthetic component of the medium grew a brilliant high-quality painting’
–Dietmar Elger
Painted in 1973, Rot-Blau-Gelb (Red-Blue-Yellow) is situated at the dawn of Gerhard Richter’s abstract practice, probing the liminal threshold between reality and representation that lies at the heart of his oeuvre. Across the work’s surface, the three primary colours dissolved into vaporous wisps of swirling elemental hues. Turbulent swathes of paint in burnished ochre, russet and umber intermingle with luminous accents of amber to form smouldering sfumato layers. Part of the series of Rot-Blau-Gelb inpaintings that Richter completed between 1972 and 1973, the work represents a compelling juncture between the twin aesthetics of photorealism and abstraction that have defined his career. A gestural extension of the Colour Charts and monochromatic Grau (Grey) paintings of 1972 to 1976, it represents an important chapter in his journey towards the Abstraktes Bilder, which he would commence just four years later. Despite enveloping the viewer in an illusionistic space, the abstract compositional surface of the painting is devoid of any figurative content. At the same time, however, the work’s palette tantalisingly evokes the Annunciation after Titian series, executed the same year, in which glimmers of tangible reality lurk seductively beneath the blurred swathes of paint. Shortly after its creation, the work was included in Richter’s solo exhibition at the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus in Munich. It has since featured in a number of important shows, including Richter’s 2009 retrospective at the Albertina, Vienna, and his major touring retrospective Panorama at the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin in 2012.
Richter’s desire to create a new, autonomous existence for painting led to an increased fascination with the optical effects of colour. Inspired by his work on the non-representational Colour Charts and Grey paintings, in 1972 Richter developed a series of Vermalung or ‘inpaintings’. Initially painted in an exclusively grey palette, Richter quickly expanded his chromatic scheme to the three primary colours, bringing to life the Rot-Blau-Gelb series. In these works Richter further explored ways in which to undermine the representational responsibility of colour, seeking new means to separate it from traditional descriptive or symbolic functions. Though gestural, the work is resolutely inexpressive: the movement of paint over the canvas is indifferent, merely a means to an end. With entropic inevitability the three primaries transform into a universal palette, blending and merging of their own accord. ‘Always uneasy about exposing subjective decisions in his work’, writes Dietmar Elger, ‘Richter succeeded in taking the inpaintings to a threshold where they exist – period. There are no underlying or overriding themes, no justifications, hierarchies, or declamations. It is nearly impossible, for example, to designate the red-blue-yellow inpaintings as colour paintings or depictions of colour; they possess, at best, an indifferent colourfulness. The title Rot-Blau-Gelb is thus a tease – less a traditional label than a list of the ingredients used in the act of painting. Yet out of this denial of every traditional semiotic and aesthetic component of the medium grew a brilliant high-quality painting’ (D. Elger, Gerhard Richter: A Life in Painting, Cologne 2002, pp. 211-214). It was this objective levelling of composition, colour and chance that would ultimately pave the way for Richter’s later use of the squeegee in his Abstraktes Bilder.