Fresh access to this Gerhard Richter painting in the Milwaukee Art Museum permanent collection galleries after all these months invites me to see it freshly. A new favorite.
Its big, wide, and tall. If I stand near it, it fills my periphery. It is hard and urban, made mechanically with harsh colors tearing a soft subtle surface the shading of skin. Slashes, some short and some long and painful with black and orange dripping from the cuts. A Rothko with its radiating orange blocks is in the next room, spiritual. This is the truth of being human and vulnerable in the city. Maybe it’s my current condition, smooth easy life cut open. The old is destroyed. The new blunt raw color revealed, pushing through, but it is not clear where life is leading...painful and sensuous are the journey. Here it is, this big pretentious painting reminding me of past, uncertain present, and emerging future.
The gallery notes on the wall are telling. Atem (Breath) it is called (purchased and acquired by MAM in 1990, the year after it was made). Made by painting in layers of oil color. The first layers of paint set and then a second layer of ephemeral color, the transience of breath. While this new layer is wet, before it has adhered to the layers below, a crinkled plastic sheet is laid on the surface pulling lines of the soft skin away as it is removed. Its handmade, nuanced. Its soft cuts the hard edges of the beginning of what is hidden, preset to be revealed.