The Bechers captured industrial forms with stunning austerity and incredible consistency.
Postwar Germany
SFMOMA talks with German artist Anselm Kiefer about exploring the past and materials in his work
An interview with Anselm Kiefer
Richter revives the genre of history painting in the 21st century in this work showing the events of 9/11.
Gerhard Richter, September
John Cage and Richter never met, but there was a kinship between these two artists with diverse practices.
Gerhard Richter, The Cage Paintings (1-6)
Hyperreal paintings like “Betty” are just one part of Richter’s practice, which resists stylistic classification.
Gerhard Richter, Betty
We’re sick with the illness of the 20th century, and only a clay-powered wooden battery thing can help.
Joseph Beuys, Table with Accumulator (Tisch mit ...
Beuys understood his art as a way to heal post-WWII Germany, but that may not be readily apparent from this work.
Joseph Beuys, Fat Chair
Beuys believed that every human being had the potential to be both creative and Christlike.
Joseph Beuys, Feet Washing and Conceptual Performance
In this canvas, Kiefer transformed architecture meant to honor Nazi heros into a memorial for their victims.
Anselm Kiefer, Shulamite
Cheap fabric with a garish print becomes an eerie specter of surveillance thanks to some creative chemistry.
Sigmar Polke, Watchtower series
Hugh Hefner turned women into objects, and Sigmar Polke turned those objects into dots.
Sigmar Polke, Bunnies
Richter toys with both visual and ethical clarity in this evocative, ambiguous painting of an uncle lost to WWII.
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