Gerhard Richter: 100 Pictures

Paintings by a German artist

Concerned with the relationship between painting and the technologically mediated image of photography, Gerhard Richter is recognized worldwide as one of the greatest living artists.

Abstract details

With a brush that deftly and romantically captures abstract details and blurred newspaper images alike, he has transformed our understanding of art in the age of photographic reproduction and mass-media imagery. "100 Pictures" is a faithful reprint of the intimate, cloth-bound book Richter created in 1996 as a nontraditional anthology of his oeuvre. Following a short introduction to his early work, which features pictures long kept in his studio, "100 Pictures" presents Richter's output from an intensive period of work between 1995-96.

Contemporary art

Though this period mainly saw the production of abstract works, it also begat a cycle of eight small-format paintings of an intimate, private nature, which portray his young wife Sabine as a Madonna-and-child. "100 Pictures" is an extraordinary document of contemporary art, finally back in print. "You must believe in what you do. You must be deeply committed in order to paint. Once you become obsessed your conviction becomes so deep that in the end you are able to believe that humanity can be transformed by painting.

Gerhard Richter Pictures

Gerhard Richter: 100 Pictures by Birgit Pelzer
Publisher: Hatje Cantz Publishers; ISBN: 3775791000

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