III. WALD 2008

This is III. WALD by Gerhard Richter. It’s hard to know exactly when it was made. Looking at it I can imagine the artist carefully applying thin layers of paint, building up the image bit by bit, only to disrupt it with that big, black, blurry form. I can feel Richter grappling with the act of seeing, questioning what is visible versus what is obscured. It reminds me of the way our perception is often clouded by our own biases and assumptions. This dark form, it hovers there, almost menacingly. I wonder if Richter was thinking about memory, and how it can both reveal and conceal. Richter is in conversation with a long line of artists who have explored the boundaries between representation and abstraction. He makes me think about what it means to create an image, to capture a moment, and to acknowledge the inherent limitations of painting. It's an ongoing dialogue and exchange of ideas across time.