A. R. Penck, Neo-Expressionist Painter Whose Work Reflected on the Postwar German Condition, Dies at 77

In 1985, A. R. Penck told curator Klaus Ottmann that he didn’t miss East Germany, where he had been born in 1939 and from which he was exiled in 1961. East Germany, Penck said, “disappeared in a black hole”—it was totally behind him. But, of course, his homeland and everything he lost when he left […]

Did Someone Say Schnabel? The “Me Generation” Retakes the Art World

“A bunch of rubbish” was the verdict, offered only half in jest by the predictably dyspeptic English journalist. He was surrounded by huge paintings covered with shards of broken crockery and slathered with crudely painted images. Yes, rubbish, but is that not the quest of the avant-garde, to magically spin art from dross like some […]