Anselm Kiefer

Anselm Kiefer
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Name	Anselm Kiefer
Caption	Kiefer in 2018
Birth date	8 March 1945
Birth place	Donaueschingen, Germany
Nationality	German
Field	Painting, Sculpture, Installation art
Training	University of Freiburg, Art Academy Düsseldorf
Movement	Neo-expressionism, New European Painting
Awards	Praemium Imperiale, Peace Prize of the German Book Trade
Website	https://www.anselmkiefer.com

Anselm Kiefer is a German painter and sculptor whose monumental, often confrontational works engage deeply with German history, mythology, and the aftermath of World War II. His practice, incorporating unconventional materials like lead, straw, and ash, is central to the Neo-expressionist movement and has profoundly influenced contemporary art. Working from vast studio complexes in Barjac, France, and later Croissy-Beaubourg, his oeuvre constitutes a relentless philosophical and material inquiry into memory, trauma, and creation.

Biography

Born in Donaueschingen in the final months of World War II, Kiefer initially studied law and Romance languages at the University of Freiburg before turning to art. He studied under Peter Dreher and later, decisively, under Joseph Beuys at the Art Academy Düsseldorf in the early 1970s, where he absorbed ideas about art's social and alchemical potential. His early photographic series, *Occupations*, and controversial paintings referencing Nazi architecture like *To the Unknown Painter* sparked intense debate in a country grappling with Vergangenheitsbewältigung. In 1993, he relocated to France, establishing an expansive studio and library in a former silk factory in Barjac, a landscape he transformed into a total artistic environment. He later moved his primary studio to Croissy-Beaubourg, near Paris.

Artistic style and themes

Kiefer's artistic style is characterized by immense, heavily textured canvases and sculptures that are both physically weighty and laden with historical and literary allusion. He employs a distinctive material palette including lead, clay, burnt books, dried flowers, barbed wire, and concrete, treating them as carriers of symbolic meaning. Central themes include the mythology and history of Germany, from the Nibelungenlied and Wagnerian operas to the ruins of the Third Reich and the Holocaust. His work persistently explores themes of spiritual desolation, cosmology, and the works of poets like Paul Celan and Ingeborg Bachmann, as well as mystical texts such as the Kabbalah. This creates a dense, often bleak tapestry that interrogates the possibility of regeneration after destruction.

Major works and exhibitions

Among his seminal works are the monumental painting *The Orders of the Night*, the lead-and-glass library installation *The High Priestess/Zweistromland*, and the haunting landscape *Margarethe*, which references Celan's poem "Death Fugue". His series *The Women of the Revolution* depicts heroines of the French Revolution. Kiefer has been the subject of major retrospectives at institutions worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Royal Academy of Arts in London, and the Grand Palais in Paris. His permanent installations include the monumental *Athanor* at the Louvre and the Gagosian Gallery frequently exhibits his new productions.

Critical reception and legacy

Kiefer's early work provoked fierce controversy in West Germany for its direct engagement with Nazi iconography, with critics like Georg Baselitz questioning its motives. However, he is now widely regarded as one of the most important European artists of the post-war era, credited with returning historical and narrative depth to painting during the dominance of American minimalism and conceptual art. His influence extends to subsequent generations of artists working with history, materiality, and scale. Scholars like Andréa Lauterwein and exhibitions at the Centre Pompidou have cemented his status as a pivotal figure in 20th-century art and a forerunner of New European Painting.

Collections and recognition

Kiefer's works are held in the permanent collections of major museums globally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tate Modern, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Albertina, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His significant awards include the Praemium Imperiale from the Japan Art Association, the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, and the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art. In 2010, he was appointed to the prestigious Chair of Poetics at the University of Frankfurt, a position previously held by Theodor W. Adorno.

Category:German contemporary artists Category:Neo-expressionism Category:1945 births