Why the Art World Is Clamoring for Anselm Kiefer Again
Famed for work that evokes war and destruction, major institutions are suddenly giving his art pride of place.
Kiefer’s Die Orden der Nacht (The Orders of the Night), 1996
Source: Anselm Kiefer
Thirty-five years after World War II, the German artist Anselm Kiefer stormed the international art scene with imagery that evoked the violence and trauma of conflict. Born in Germany in 1945, he grew up under the weight of his country’s recent history. His landscapes of sinister forests, photographic self-portraits depicting him doing a Nazi salute and books made from scraps of his own burnt oil paintings hit audiences like a bucket of ice water.
For some time, Kiefer’s art was both fresh and weighty for a jaded contemporary milieu. “I have been going to the press views of museum shows for more than thirty years, and I’ve never seen anything to equal the solemnity of this one,” wrote the critic Hilton Kramer after attending the Art Institute of Chicago’s 1987 retrospective. And as such, his art was sought out by collectors and museums around the world for decades.