About Gerhard Richter

Gerhard Richter

8.3.85

1985
Watercolour, graphite and oil on paper
9 3/8 x 6 3/8 inches (23,8 x 16,3 cm)

Gerhard Richter, one of the most diverse artists of the turn of the millennium, works with a variety of media techniques. The offered paperwork from the prominent Amsterdam “Overholland Collection” is a fine example of this. Created in the mid-1980s, these works are considered the pinnacle of abstract creativity.

In 1984/85 Richter's more intensive examination of the qualities and possibilities of watercolour technology took place. Richter often works on several pages a day. Like no other, Gerhard Richter knows how to put the paint on paper and let the pictorial structure emerge layer by layer from the painting process. In our example, strong unmixed primary and complementary colours – blue, green and orange – dominate our paperwork and can thus unfold with full force. The working method requires patience, since watercolouring has to be interrupted to dry before the artist can apply the next layer of paint such as the oil in grey. Richter reinterprets the medium of watercolour for himself and increases it to the highest concentration and intensity.