Georg Baselitz, London
Date
-
Opening Hours
Location
Tate Modern
About
Georg Baselitz is a German painter, sculptor and graphic artist. In the 1960s he became well known for his figurative, expressive paintings. In 1969 he began painting his subjects upside down in an effort to overcome the representational, content-driven character of his earlier work and stress the artifice of painting. Drawing from myriad influences, including art of Soviet era illustration art, the Mannerist period and African sculptures, he developed his own, distinct artistic language.
He was born as Hans-Georg Kern in Deutschbaselitz, Upper Lusatia, Germany. He grew up amongst the suffering and demolition of World War II, and the concept of destruction plays a significant role in his life and work. These biographical circumstances are recurring aspects of his entire oeuvre. In this context, the artist stated in an interview: "I was born into a destroyed order, a destroyed landscape, a destroyed people, a destroyed society. And I didn't want to reestablish an order: I had seen enough of so-called order. I was forced to question everything, to be 'naive', to start again." By disrupting any given orders and breaking the common conventions of perception, Baselitz has formed his personal circumstances into his guiding artistic principles. To this day, he still inverts all his paintings, which has become the unique and most defining feature of his work.
Resources
his display draws from ARTIST ROOMS, a touring collection of over 1,600 works of modern and contemporary art by 42 major artists. The collection is displayed across the UK through a touring programme, supported by Arts Council England, Art Fund and Creative Scotland. The ARTIST ROOMS collection is owned jointly by Tate and the National Galleries of Scotland and was established through The d’Offay Donation in 2008, with the assistance of the National Heritage Memorial Fund, Art Fund and the Scottish and British Governments.
The ARTIST ROOMS Gallery opened in the Blavatnik Building on 17 June 2016 with an exhibition of Louise Bourgeois, followed by Bruce Nauman in 2017 and Jenny Holzer in 2018.
