International News Digest

FEBRUARY 23

On the occasion of Gerhard Richter’s eightieth birthday and the opening of his retrospective at the Neue Nationalgalerie, Catrin Lorch, in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, called the artist “the most important painter of today.” Die Welt’s Patrick Bahners wrote: “The powerful love him as the Rubens of our times.” Noting that many artists face the risk of “submitting to the pull of today’s visual language, which leans toward arbitrariness, or conversely of turning one’s own decisiveness into a gimmick,” the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung’s Swantje Karich wrote that “Gerhard Richter has no use for this egomania; the abyss of the system has no power over him.”

Meanwhile, Die Tageszeitung’s Ralf Hanselle discussed the stratospheric prices of Richter’s works with historian Daniel von Schacky, who pointed out: “The air is thinner at the top. The higher the prices, the smaller the number of potential buyers. All the same . . . it is very likely that prices will go up further.” Yet von Schacky noted that Richter’s “collectors are a varied bunch. There are lawyers and psychologists as well as investment bankers and entrepreneurs. Many simply value Richter’s exploration of the role of painting today.” In an interview with Welt am Sonntag via |Monopol|, Richter himself confessed that he had little use for many collectors who spend millions on his works: “For me a good collector is someone I’ve never met.” He also responded to the praise accompanying his Berlin retrospective (and its earlier iteration at London’s Tate Modern) with skepticism, too, stating: “They always say it’s great. And it means nothing.”

Meanwhile, author and film director Alexander Kluge—who in Monopol paid homage to his friend Richter with eleven literary “odes” to 1966, a key year for the artist’s oeuvre—has seen his own eightieth birthday celebrated in various publications. In Die Tageszeitung, contributor Ingo Arend praised Kluge for “tying political thought back to the realm of life,” while Dirk Knipphals wondered why only Kluge had the idea of Theodor Adorno and Niklas Luhmann meeting in a Frankfurt wine bar: “Why does no one else dare to do this sort of thing?” Speaking to Die Welt’s Andreas Rosenfelder, Kluge recalled the birthdays of his childhood: “You were so excited and overstrained that in the evening there were always strife and tears. Then you had to go to bed without dinner. A traditional birthday. I asked Adorno, and it was the same for him.” In an interview with Der Tagesspiegel, Kluge discussed the importance of the past, saying: “The twenty-first century is overly complex. So many things come at you—problems and undigested conflicts. One should anchor oneself very strongly. That’s why I’m interested in my ancestors right now.”

Miles away from the birthday celebrations, the government of Abu Dhabi has decided to combine its own ministries of tourism and culture, according to the Art Newspaper’s Helen Stoilas. As Stoilas reports, the government-run Gulf News asserted that the new organization would “retain the assets, mandates and staff of the two agencies,” explaining: “The establishment of the authority is part of the plan for tourism development in Abu Dhabi, where the local heritage is considered to be central to tourism development in the emirate.” The news comes after Slovenia’s prime minister recently decided to do away with the nation’s cultural ministry, passing its responsibilities on to the ministry of education and sport. Might this be the beginning of a worldwide trend?