Anselm Kiefer – Where Have All the Flowers Gone

Description

Over the past sixty years, the artist Anselm Kiefer has created an imposing body of work. He expresses both the beauty and the dark sides of human history in his monumental paintings, woodcuts, sculptures and installations, which are replete with references to literature, poetry, religion, science and mysticism.

In the 1960s, Kiefer was one of the first artists to break taboos when addressing Germany’s wartime past. To this day, his work invites us to reflect on the madness of war, the fate of humanity and art’s power to keep memory alive.

This publication accompanies the exhibition Anselm Kiefer: Where Have All the Flowers Gone – a unique collaboration between the Van Gogh Museum and the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. With incisive essays by Antje von Graevenitz and Simon Schama, and a reflection by the artist himself, it focuses on his personal fascination with Vincent van Gogh and on the early, positive reception of Kiefer’s work in the Netherlands.

The catalogue offers an in-depth exploration of the exhibition through rich illustrations and wide-ranging texts, and sheds new light on the work of one of the most influential artists of our time.