Arnulf Rainer. Photographs

Arnulf Rainer, born in 1929 in Baden, near Vienna, is one of the most important post-1945 European artists. He became known especially for his gestural style and overpaintings of works of his own and those of others, some of which were photographs. For the past three years, Rainer has been taking photographs on his own.
This is the first publication to present the artist’s little known photographic works. All sixty-nine of his photographs to date, in which he explores a territory beyond all conventions of the medium, are united in this book. Instead of “depicting” something, his photographs-“non-photos full of question marks”-present riddles. Set up like paintings, but created using “estranged photographic means,” as Robert Fleck wrote, they are formal references to Rainer’s abstract painting. By blurring areas of the image, using indeterminate spatial coordinates, and partially covering the aperture, he creates photos that seem unintentional and autonomous, then superimposes them with his trademark iconoclastic gestures.

Exhibition schedule: Galerie Karl Pfefferle, Munich, September 9-October 22, 2005