Townscape M2 1968

Gerhard Richter, a real thinker when it comes to the material properties of painting, has given us this grayscale Townscape M2. Look at the thick impasto, the paint applied so densely that the surface has real texture, that catches the light in different ways! I can imagine Richter in the studio, maybe it’s cold, and he's daubing on the shades of grey, pushing the paint around, scraping it back, and then adding more, searching for the feel of the town, its weight, its light, its somberness, and all of this is caught in the push and pull of the paint. There is a constant dialogue between representation and abstraction in his practice. What does it mean to create something from nothing? Richter, like many painters, seems to embrace the ambiguity and uncertainty of painting as a medium. And the conversation continues.