Back to the Easel:

Neo-Expressionism and the Return of Painting

(left) David Salle (US, b. 1952), His Brain, 1984, oil
and acrylic on canvas, acrylic on fabric, two panels,
9 ft 9 in x 8 ft 10 in overall (Pictures generation)

(below) compare Salle with James Rosenquist (US,

b. 1933), President Elect, 1960 (American Pop)
David Salle, Géricault’s Arm, 1985, oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 6' 57∕8” x 8' 1∕4" The Museum
of Modern Art, New York
 Eric Fischl (US, b. 1948) Bad Boy,
1981, oil on canvas, 5ft 6in x 8ft
decadent suburbia

Edgar Degas, Interior,1868-9

Secret brutalities of middle class
lives
Eric Fischl, Sleepwalker, 1979, oil on canvas

“What’s an adolescent boy’s masturbation about anyway if it’s not, in some sense, a separation technique?
He’s separating from his parents. He’s becoming aware of himself.” - Fischl
Eric Fischl, A Visit to / A Visit from / The Island, oil on canvas, 84 x 168 inches, 1983, Whitney Museum of Art, NYC
(left) Eric Fischl, Bedroom Scene #7 (After the Tantrum, Unholy News) 2004, oil on linen, 65 x 98 in.,
from series of 12 large paintings in The Krefeld Project,

(right) compare Edouard Manet (French,1832-1883), In the Garden, 1879, oil on canvas, 115 x 150 cm
“The Painter of Modern Life”

For several days two actors posed for artist in Museum Haus Esters in Krefeld, Germany, which was designed
by Mies van der Rohe in 1928 to be a private home. Furnished for the shoots by the artist. Fischl took
approximately 2,000 photographs
Eric Fischl, Krefeld Project: Dining Room Scene 2, 2003, oil on Linen, 89 x 124
inches.
Eric Fischl, Bedroom Scene #1, 2003, from photographic series: “The Krefeld Project” (2002)
(right) compare Edward Hopper (US, 1882-1967), Hotel Room, 1931, oil on linen
Jean-Michel Basquiat (US, 1960 - 1988)
in his studio, 1985 (25 years old)

1996 movie directed by

Julian Schnabel
 In 1977 Basquiat (17 years old) started to spray paint cryptic sayings on subway trains and around
lower Manhattan and signing them SAMO©. This video still is from 1981

"SAMO© as an end to mindwash religion, nowhere politics, and bogus philosophy…. SAMO© saves idiots“
Basquait
 Poster for a 1980 movie

In June of 1980, more than a hundred artists, including Jean

Michel Basquiat, organized by Colab (Collaborative Projects),
took over a four-story building on Forty-first Street and
Times Square Show, 2nd floor shows paintings by Seventh Avenue and mounted a two-month exhibition.
Tom Otterness announcing types of art inside
John Ahearn and Tom Otterness, Times Square Show Floor Plans, 1980. Ink on paper, each 8 ½ x 14 in.
 Jean-Michel Basquiat, Boy and Dog in a Johnnypump, 1982, Acrylic, oil
paintstick, and spray paint on canvas, 7ft 10in x 13ft 9in

“Basquiat’s work gives that private anguish artistic expression.” bell hooks
 Nkisi Nkondi religious idol of
the Kongo people of West
Central Africa. Figures are
made by religious specialists.
Nkondi is the hunter who
tracks down evil doers.
Jean-Michel Basquiat, Charles the First, 1982, acrylic
and oilstick on canvas, triptych, 6ft 6in x 5ft 2in
Jean-Michel Basquiat, Grillo, 1984, oil, acrylic, oilstick, photocopy
collage, and nails on wood (in four parts), 96 x 211 1∕2 x 18"
 Basquiat portrait by Warhol, 1984

Basquiat and Warhol in 1984. Warhol dies in 1987.

1985
Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol, Untitled, 1985. Synthetic
polymer paint on canvas, 116 7∕8 x 165 3∕8"
Endof Modern Art in Nazi Germany 1933-45
(left) Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (German Expressionist,1880-
1938) Girl Under a Japanese Umbrella, 1906, oil, 36 x 31”
(right) Emil Nolde (German, 1867-1956), Excited People, 1910
(below) Degenerate Art Exhibition, 1937
 Composition with Blue, 1926
Piet Mondrian, oil, 24 in. sq
“Degenerate art”

The poster of the Degenerate Music

exhibition (1938). Jewish Composers and
Jazz/Swing musicians were, for instance,
accused by the Nazis to produce Marc Chagall, Purim, 1916-18, oil,
"degenerated music"... 20 x 28 in, “Degenerate art”
“Good German Art” – Nazi art
National Socialist Realism
Joseph Beuys, How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare,1965 performance in Düsseldorf
 (left and center) Anselm Kiefer (German b. 1945), Occupations, from the conceptual art photographic series, 1969
(below center and right) Kiefer, Heroic Symbols, 1969, watercolor and gouache on paper, left sheet: 6 in. sq., right sheet: 22
x 16 in.

This small self-portrait of the artist giving the Nazi salute is

pasted on the same sheet as the watercolor of the sky, which,
according to the artist, has been wounded by shots.
(left) Anselm Kiefer, Heroic Symbol 5, 1970
(right) Barbara Kruger, Untitled (We Don’t Need Another Hero), 1987. Photoscreenprint on vinyl. 109” × 209”
Anselm Kiefer, Interior (Innenraum),1981, oil, acrylic,
and paper on canvas, 121” across

(above) source photograph of the Mosaic Room in

the New Reich Chancellery, Adolf Hitler’s government
offices in Berlin, which were destroyed in 1945.
Designed by the architect Albert Speer to assert the
Third Reich’s historical continuity with the great
ancient civilizations of Egypt, Greece and Rome.
What does neo-classical architecture signify?
Anselm Kiefer, Your Golden Hair, Margarete, 1981, oil, emulsion, and straw on canvas, 51 x 67”
Anslem Kiefer Twilight of the West [Abendland] 1989, lead sheet, synthetic polymer paint, ash, plaster, cement, earth,
varnish on canvas and wood, 400 cm H
Gerhard Richter and Konrad Lueg, Living With Pop, 1963: a performance of “Capitalist Realism”

A group of artists in Düsseldorf mounted an installation of objects in a local department store, installing themselves as well as
things (commodities) for the home as a demonstration of "Capitalist Realism." What earlier, state-supported realism was this
"Capitalist Realism" responding to? (Answer: Socialist Realism mandated by the East German Communist regime.)

Richard Hamilton (British), Just What Is It

That Makes Today’s Homes So Different, So
Appealing?, Pop Art, 1956 10.25 in × 9.75”
Kunsthalle Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
Gerhard Richter (b. Dresden, 1932), [Nazi officer] Uncle Rudi, 1965, oil on canvas
(right) Administrative Building, 1964, Oil on canvas, 38 1/4 x 59 “
photo sources – family snapshot and encyclopedia

“I believe in nothing”
 Richter, Aunt Marianne, oil on canvas, 1965, 47 x 51 in
from a photograph of Richter as a baby with Aunt Marianne
“Whenever I behaved badly I was told you will become like crazy Marianne.”
Richter, Phantom Interceptors, 1964, oil on canvas, 55" x 6' 3“
(right) Alpha Romeo (With Text), 1965, oil on canvas, 60 x 59”
3.2 Gerhard Richter, Annunciation After Titian, 1973. Oil on canvas, 49 1∕4 x 78 3∕4" (125 x
200 cm). Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C. Courtesy Atelier
 Richter, Betty, 1988, oil on canvas, 40 x 23“
compare (right) Untitled, 1987

“Painting is the form of the picture, you might say. The picture is the depiction, and
painting is the technique for shattering it.”
Jörg Immendorff (b. 1941 Silesia, East Germany, now Poland), Can one change
anything with these?, 1972, acrylic on canvas, 20 x 31 ½ in

Joseph Beuys lecturing in NYC,1974

Jörg Immendorff (b. 1941 Silesia, now Poland) , Café Deutschland I, 1978,
oil on canvas, 280 x 320 cm
 Compare Expressionism of Max Beckmann, Night, 1917-18
with Neo-Expressionism of Immendorff, Café Deutschland I, 1978
What do they have in common in form and content?
Jörg Immendorff, Café Deutschland, 1984, oil, 285 cm high
(right) Georg Grosz, Metropolis, 1917