Gerhard Richter and the Technological Condition of Painting

Aline Guillermet

Hardback
$120.00
Ebook (ePub) i
$120.00
Ebook (PDF) i
$120.00
 
Studies the impact of science and technology on the painting of Gerhard Richter
  • Argues that science and technology provide a prism through which to consider Richter’s painterly production as a coherent set of practices over the past 70 years
  • Sheds new light on key paintings in Richter’s corpus, including Ema: Nude on a Staircase; 18 October 1977; Strips, by uncovering the little-explored connection between painterly genres and techno-science as tool and metaphor for artistic production
  • Draws on unpublished material discovered in Richter’s archive, as well as on new research in the field of postwar art, for example the influence of 1960s computer art on Richter’s later production
  • Establishes new connections between Richter and key figures in North American and European postwar painting: Robert Rauschenberg; Roy Lichtenstein; Sigmar Polke; Anselm Kiefer; Karl Otto Götz
  • Takes Richter as a starting point to reflect on the contemporary creation and reception of painting in a digital context

Aline Guillermet uncovers Richter’s appropriation of science and technology from 1960 to the present and shows how this has shaped the artist’s well-documented engagement with the canon of Western painting.

Show more

Introduction

Art, science and technology

Photographic objectivity: from representation to visualisation

Methodological approach and challenges

Outline of chapters

1. Scientific Realism and Portraiture

Solvent transfer in the photo-paintings: Richter and Rauschenberg

Silkscreening and blurring: Richter and Warhol

The Pop portrait

Gerhard Richter’s Ema: Nude on a Staircase

2. Photography and History Painting

Painting history from photographs

The October cycle as history painting?

The photograph as "tear-image"

3. Biological Chance and Landscape Painting

"Painting like nature": The artistic value of biological chance

From photo-paintings of landscapes to overpainted landscapes

The politics of the landscape

4. Electron Microscopy and the Ornament

The Silicate paintings

The politics and aesthetics of the ornament

The digital ornament

Coda: Towards Digital Painting

Bibliography

The most important painter of our times is rediscovered anew in this remarkable study: from chronophotography to electron microscopy, Guillermet reveals how Gerhard Richter’s lifelong engagement with techniques of visualisation has shaped his practice as a painter, bringing together art and science, and opening up new perspectives.
Jason Gaiger, The Ruskin School of Art, The University of Oxford

Recommend to your Librarian

Request a Review Copy

Also in this series

You might also like ...