The raw intensity of abstraction is fit into the direct clarity of figuration: dollops of white paint with black hearts have yellow-orange accents, vague little areas of royal blue float without anchor, and algae-colored stains on the bottom are more like the misremembered synthesis of a meadow than like any one thing you’d ever see. more

Kiefer’s ‘laßt tausend Blumen blühen,’ 2012. (© Anselm Kiefer, courtesy Gagosian Gallery, photograph by Charles Duprat)

detail ‘laßt tausend Blumen blühen,’

Kiefer’s ‘der Morgenthau-Plan,’ 2012. (© Anselm Kiefer, courtesy Gagosian Gallery, photograph by Charles Duprat)

detail der Morgenthau-Plan