Roger Herman employs the stylistic vocabulary of German Expressionism as a distancing device for a more conceptual exploration of painting itself. Yet whereas artists such as Anselm Kiefer and Markus Lüpertz envelop this critique within the context (read “neurosis”) of recent German history and myth, Herman pursues more overtly autobiographical and philosophical themes. He is, in many ways, an alienated romantic, asserting his faith in pure expression through painting, while simultaneously questioning the viability of the image in an age of media appropriation. He is very much like an artisan