The exhibition Georg Baselitz: The Last Ten Years, hosted by Sabancı University Sakıp Sabancı Museum (SSM) featuring the works of German painter, sculptor and printmaker Georg Baselitz, has opened. The exhibition, which spreads across all gallery areas and the garden of the SSM, includes nearly one hundred monumental paintings and sculptures that Baselitz produced in the last ten years. A comprehensive selection of the artist's prints is also simultaneously meeting the audience at Akbank Sanat. The works in the exhibition offer an in-depth look at Baselitz's lifelong artistic evolution.
Speaking at the opening of the exhibition, SSM Director Dr. Nazan Ölçer said, “This exhibition of Baselitz's giant-sized paintings and sculptures leaves the audience alone with a magnificent visual feast, while also inviting them to witness the artist's ongoing reckoning with the history of the land where he was born. Sakıp Sabancı Museum offers art lovers the opportunity to discover Baselitz’s world, where the past is never forgotten but is constantly reinterpreted through his art,” he said.
Sir Norman Rosenthal, who curated the exhibition and has a friendship with the artist dating back to the late 1970s, emphasized in his speech that the exhibition offers an in-depth look at Baselitz’s creative process over the last decade, as well as revealing the artist’s spirit of constantly seeking innovation. Rosenthal said, “The works that Georg Baselitz has produced over the last decade once again reveal the artist’s ability to constantly reinvent himself. This exhibition in Istanbul reveals Baselitz’s concentration on themes of memory and the past, while focusing on the human figure, especially himself. Baselitz’s works reflect both personal and collective history, shedding light not only on the artist’s artistic journey, but also on his thoughts on time and mortality.”
The Georg Baselitz: The Last Ten Years exhibition consists of determined motifs that have become evident in the artist’s works over the years, and particularly highlights his works on the human figure. Baselitz’s works depicting the bodies of himself and his wife Elke deal with the issues of aging and the transience of time. Baselitz’s eagles, which he has handled in various techniques since the 1950s and which remind him of his childhood in Deutschbaselitz, return in a series rendered on blue backgrounds. The last painting of the series, dated 2024, meets visitors for the first time in this exhibition. Similarly, the deer motif he has been painting since his childhood reappears as a part of the mythological iconography that has guided his works since the beginning of his career. The Springtime series, which is the highlight of the exhibition and collages nylon stockings on upside-down figures, is inspired by Dada collage artist Hannah Höch. These works emphasize the transience of time through the fragility of the material. The monumental sculptures exhibited in the museum’s galleries and garden also form a whole with the iconography and historical themes of the paintings.
Who is Georg Baselitz?
Georg Baselitz, an artist who has left a deep mark on the international art world since the 1980s, has given German art a new identity in the second half of the 20th century. His works have been shaped by his personal experiences as well as Germany’s collective trauma and the deep wounds left in the collective memory by the Nazi era. The artist’s paintings, which he has been using the “upside down” composition technique since 1969, make up almost the entirety of the exhibition. This approach has enabled him to stand somewhere between abstraction and figuration, and to find a new perspective in the traditional canvas painting technique.
Source: https://artdogistanbul.com/altust-olmus-bir-dunya-georg-baselitz-ssmde/