I’ve been a fan of Gerhard Richter’s paintings for a long time, but have never before seen how he makes his abstract works – I mean, I could tell that he used some sort of squeegee tool to pull the paint across the canvas, but never imagined that he actually did it standing up with the canvas on the wall. For some reason, I just assumed he did this with the canvas flat on the floor or on a table. So with that in mind, check out this video showing how he makes these paintings. One other thing to note – I can see how someone might say: “oh, anyone can put paint on a canvas and squeegee it,” but there’s a lot more to it than just that … for one thing, one would have to know how to layer the paint and make decisions on placement of colors before the squeegee process starts, but then there’s the question: when do you stop? Maybe it’s less about the technique being used, but rather getting the final image that Richter is seeking with this technique.
On a side note, I find it interesting that sometimes he is making the work while wearing a collared dress shirt and slacks … just a day “in the office?”