Archimedes

This artwork featured in Never Judge a Book (2016). 

Each of the vitrines contain on of the artist’s celebrated books. Here, Kiefer has overlaid seascapes with mathematical formulae and diagrams – a reference to Euclid, the father of Western geometry. Kiefer contemplates the limits of humanity’s noble but futile obsession with mapping and measurement. Books play a crucial part in Kiefer’s work; they symbolise the ultimate human endeavour to make sense of the world, through knowledge, philosophy or narratives.

Kiefer, however, also reminds us that the process of formalising human spirit in the written form can also be fraught, heavy and at times, dangerous, “The book, the idea of a book or the image of a book, is a symbol of learning, of transmitting knowledge. I make books to find my way through the old stories” says Kiefer.

Image: Anselm Kiefer, Archimedes, graphite, charcoal and watercolour on black and white photograph. Image courtesy Meadow Arts. 

 

About the artist

Anselm Kiefer

Anselm Kiefer exhibited in Never Judge a Book, Richard Booth’s Bookshop, 2016.

 

Image: Anselm Kiefer, Archimedes, 2011. Graphite, charcoal and watercolour on black and white photograph. Copyright Anselm Kiefer. Courtesy White Cube.