Markus Lüpertz; Photo by Giulio Coscia, courtesy of the artist
The German artist Markus Lüpertz, 82, has been making his mark on the art world for some six decades. The Phillips Collection in Washington DC which held a Lüpertz retrospective in 2017, has called him, "One of the most important post-World War II artists in Germany," adding that, "Markus Lüpertz helped chronicle and shape the postwar image of his country, achieving enormous success across Europe."
Markus the Painter or The Ratio of the Impossible is Lüpertz's first ever career survey in Los Angeles, a selection of almost thirty paintings made between 1964 and 2021, beautifully installed in the Vito Schnabel gallery in the former Old Post Office in Santa Monica; and where I had the opportunity to interview Lüpertz and have him walk me through the exhibition with his wife, Dunja, and his daughter, Lilli, who served as our translator.