Georg Baselitz

This is a post in our Artist of the Week series



Georg Baselitz was born in 1938 in Saxony (part of what would become East Germany).

He attended public school where he began to grow a fascination for art. He spent his early teen years painting landscapes, portraits, religious scenes, still lifes - nearly everything he could and some of them would be in a truly futuristic style.

As he grew older he continued to study art and in the late 50s and early 60s he began to develop his own paintings with a unique style of his own. He even started to made up imaginary portraits and giving them titles like Uncle Bernhard. In 1963, Georg held his own solo exhibition. Two of the paintings were seized by the public prosecutor and the ensuing court case lasted 1965.

It was around this time that his paintings began to gain attention and he was offered a six month scholarship to study painting in Italy. When he returned he started having regular exhibitions at Galerie Heiner Friedrich. Around this time his main focus was on landscapes and the idea of picture-in-a-picture. In 1972 he began using a fingerpainting technique.



He continued to travel and gain inspiration for his pictures. In 1976 he set up a studio in Italy and remained there until 1981. In 1982 his focus began to move from painting to sculpture and they started to feature a Christian theme. By this time interest in his work has spread all the way to the states.

By the 90s his work was being exhibited throughout Europe. Recently the Museum Frieder Burda and Baden-Baden’s Staatliche Kunsthalle held and exhibition of 140 of Baselitz works featuring "50 years of painting" and "30 years of sculpture."

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