Günther FörgZwölf Bleibilder

Günther Förg – the last publication in his lifetime! For the first time this publication presents twelve large-format lead paintings by Günther Förg (each 240 x 160 cm) from 1989. The large, full-page reproductions, each 31 x 21 cm, convey an immediate impression, hitherto scarcely attainable, of the effect the originals produce. For, as Max Wechsler describes it in his text, “the particular appeal of the lead paintings lies not least, of course, in their materiality and in the unique physical quality of this rather unusual painting ground. Added to this is the special colouring of lead, which, shimmering and shifting between grey and blue, appears like a darkly threatening massing of storm clouds with its infinite values of gloom, and enters into a subtle interplay with natural and artificial patinas. This organically appearing surface is now countered, in the painterly delivery, by the straight-edged geometric figurations of the divisions. Out of this subtle opposition a field of tension opens up, against whose background the systematic compositional programmes and the more intuitively developed investigations of colour relationships take effect with the utmost concentration. This surely also has to do with the fact that the application of paint to lead evidently proceeds almost without resistance, which in turn flatters Förg’s notorious penchant for speed. One reason for this rapid gliding lies, of course, in the fact that this painting ground is absolutely non-absorbent and the paint substance is deposited, as it were, upon the surface.” The volume’s second author, Britta Schröder, accordingly describes the overwhelming effect as a self-contained cosmos: “The colour does not press into space but clings to the surface as if to a magnet. With some of them there is reason to fear that they will swallow parts of the painting if one gazes at them for too long. In return, one plunges into forms of colour whose suction takes one in as if one were falling headlong into a black hole.”

Exhibition:
Galerie Bärbel Grässlin Frankfurt, 23/3 – 27/4/2013