Press release
Galerie Michael Werner, Märkisch Wilmersdorf is pleased to announce an exhibition with 15 monotypes by German artist Markus Lüpertz (*1941, Liberec, Böhmen). The artist‘s gift and stylistic assurance to make use of different media is allying in the monotypes printing process, which combines painting, drawing and graphics. Although Lüpertz is using a printing technique, the results are unique: The artist applied the image on the plate with oil and tempera and instantaneously printed the motif on handmade paper in moist condition. Only one single printing process is possible, every copy is exceptional.
The presented monotypes are part of the series Männer ohne Frauen. Parsifal / Men Without Women. Parsifal (1994) and Vasen / Vases (1995), reflecting the serial character of Markus Lüpertz‘s artistic creation. The works Men Without Women. Parsifal – the title is referring to Richard Wagner‘s same-named ‘play of consecration’ which was performed for the first time in 1882 – fit into a large body of work Lüpertz has already elaborated on canvas and paper since 1993 and built in bronze since 1994. The prints shown in Märkisch Wilmersdorf are following the composition previously developed in two-dimensional pictorial media: Heads in frontal view are centered in the image. The physiognomies of the faces like eyes, brows, nose, mouth, neck and chin are formed by outlining color streaks, which are sometimes sharp drawn, sometimes self-liquidating. The face is framed by a helmet-like coiffure, the head is bordered by monochrome color fields, and the entire image area is often interspersed by a grid of lines.
Pinched looking, presaging a vague smile, the facial expression is barely legible so that the faces couldn’t be understood as a mirror of the soul. The anonymized “portraits“ prevent an emotional approach, they discourage an identification with the pictured faces and thus induce a perceptual process which mainly follows esthetic categories and, as art historian Wolfgang Kersten is pointing out, which tends to abstract the figurative and to explore the figurative in the abstract. The presented monotypes of antiques vases are subject to this kind of perceptual process as well. Besides they are akin to the head images regarding the position of the object depicted as well as the negation of any spatiality; both of these devices are serving as compositional elements which give the depiction an icon-like presence.
Like the whole œuvre by Markus Lüpertz the monotypes are following the modernistic tradition which subordinates the depictive and narrative function of the arts enhancing their visual quality. Following this, Markus Lüpertz says in 1983: “I want to find out whether a specific school of painting can still be built up, with specific rules, so that you can go there and make painting aggressive as painting, make painting great as painting, get excited by painting, but always using the means of painting, not from the subject angle.“ Thus the vases are melting into swirls of color, the pastily applied color is drippling of Parsifal’s cheeks, trickles and hair ends. Any facial expression is disappearing in the deep black of the streaks pulling oil paint which swallows every narrative moment and emphasizes the painterly one.
Markus Lüpertz was born in 1941 in Liberec, Bohemia, in the current Czech Republic. He studied at the Werkkunstschule Krefeld and at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, where he became professor in 1986 and served as director from 1988 until 2009. Markus Lüpertz is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Villa Romana Prize (1970), the German Critics Association Prize (1970), and the IVth International Prize "Julio González" (2004). This November he will be awarded the Grand Prix artistique de la Fondation Simone et Cino Del Duca.
Important retrospective surveys of the artist’s work were recently presented at Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn (2009); Gemeentemuseum, The Hague (2011); Museo de Bellas Artes, Bilbao (2014) and The Hermitage State Museum, St. Petersburg (2014). Currently Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris is honoring Markus Lüpertz with a wide retrospective, which is on view until July 19th, 2015. Markus Lüpertz lives and works in Düsseldorf and Berlin.
The exhibition opens at Galerie Michael Werner in Märkisch Wilmersdorf 8 June 2015 and remains on view through 31 July 2015. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 10am to 5pm. Booking in advance is recommended by phone +49 (0)33731 32010 or email galeriewerner@michaelwerner.de.