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Lot Essay
"Of all the West German artists who rode to international prominence more than a decade ago on the wave of Neo-Expressionism, none have been more compelling or less predictable than Gerhard Richter. A painter during the early 1960's of blurred black-and-white images derived from photographs of the most banal sort, Mr. Richter produced monochromatic compositions during the later 60's and early 70's, many of which consisted of little more than meandering gray lines against gray backdrops...Then, in 1976, the artist began to make the high-keyed, flamboyantly gestured abstractions that have since largely occupied his attention and that have caused him to be linked-- in many ways wrongly-- with West German Neo-Expressionists like Anselm Kiefer and Georg Baselitz.
To the same degree that Mr. Richter's color charts were orderly and exacting, his abstractions of recent years have seemed disorderly, arbitrary and entirely unfettered. But in fact Mr. Richter has never been in less than total command of every inch of each canvas"
(M. Kimmelman, "Review/Art; Small-Scale Works on Paper by Gerhard Richter," The New York Times, 29 December 1989).
To the same degree that Mr. Richter's color charts were orderly and exacting, his abstractions of recent years have seemed disorderly, arbitrary and entirely unfettered. But in fact Mr. Richter has never been in less than total command of every inch of each canvas"
(M. Kimmelman, "Review/Art; Small-Scale Works on Paper by Gerhard Richter," The New York Times, 29 December 1989).