‘I try to squeeze as much as possible from a single idea, trying to be as un-analytical
as possible on one hand and as rational as possible on the other.
I try to control it to a point, until I can’t control it anymore and then I let go.’
— Daniel Richter
Daniel Richter’s new series of vibrant large-scale oil paintings convey unprecedented movement, tension, and even fury, as the title Furor I suggests, through the interplay of swift lines, vibrant blocks of colour and areas of negative space.
Watch Daniel Richter discuss the exhibition and his latest work
‘I find pleasure in smearing all these clean elements, and once I’ve smeared them around, then I force the things I did back into a shape. It’s a way of thinking and doing things and experimenting; and some are very analytical and some more fun. The main thing is to surprise myself at least a little.’
— Daniel Richter
In these new paintings, the artist’s shifting figures flicker in and out of view, seeming to unite human and non-human elements through the combination of separate, soft-edged, multicoloured patches applied with a palette knife, and stark contours in well-defined graphic strokes of oil crayon. The artist paints the colour fields first before outlining the composition, allowing his directed use of colour to structure the work, rather than the line.
KATHARSIS IN UNTERWÄSCHE, 2021
Oil on canvas
230 x 170 cm (90.55 x 66.93 in)
‘Richter's works to date have demonstrated an impressive complexity and versatility, since his style is constantly changing while still remaining true to his basic principles. [...] With their dazzling colors and pulsating insistence, their latent aggressiveness and wealth of edgy effects, his works are nonetheless immediately recognizable as such. Richter’s works interlock set pieces of art history, the mass media, and pop culture to create idiosyncratic pictorial worlds.’
— Max Hollein
‘My interest was in transforming this sad and humanistic image into a joyful painting: you can see elements of where they turn into insects and machinery, or sad grotesque elements like the giant floating tears, or broken ribs [...] and sometimes they just look like colourful butterflies.’ — Daniel Richter
ZWEIFEL, IN DEN WIND GESCHLAGEN, 2021
Oil on canvas
220 x 165 cm (86.61 x 64.96 in)
‘It is hard to escape history and tradition, especially in something as conservative as painting. I work with all these contradictions.’
— Daniel Richter
The artist’s original inspiration for the Furor I series is a 1916 postcard depicting soldiers on crutches with missing legs. These silhouettes reappear in paintings like Licht ohne Trost (Light without Comfort, 2021), limping figures, their crutches and prosthetic legs interchangeable with their remaining limbs in an unresolved tangle of soft-edged, multicoloured patches.
LICHT OHNE TROST, 2021
Oil on canvas
220 x 165 cm (86.61 x 64.96 in)
The paintings’ loosening, dissolving lines open to release monstrous extensions to the bodies depicted by Richter. As with Gilles Deleuze’s description of the outlines in Francis Bacon’s paintings as ‘membranes’ through which material and figure flow, the same could be said for Richter’s works. ‘The shadow escapes from the body like an animal we had been sheltering.’
FÜSSE, AUA, 2021
Oil on canvas
230 x 170 cm (90.55 x 66.93 in)
‘It’s more a question of systems of representation rather than portraying the body as a carnal, biological thing.’ — Daniel Richter
Gemesser mit Eiern, 2021
Oil on canvas
230 x 170 cm (90.55 x 66.93 in)
Daniel Richter’s figures gradually dissolve and open up as they shift from left to right, like soldiers marching in the same direction. As they transition from one picture plane and one state of being to the next, they seem to leak out of their contours, evoking a post-human world in which beings exist at a transhumanistic juncture between person, animal, and formless colour field.
PERLENMÜLL, 2021
Oil on canvas
230 x 170 cm (90.55 x 66.93 in)
The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue with research material by Daniel Richter.
