(born in Dresden in 1932)
Rot-Blau-Gelb, 1973, signed, dated on the reverse Richter, 73 and numbered 86 (from the edition of 100 originals), oil on canvas, 26.4 x 53.4 cm, Edition Galerie Seriaal, Amsterdam, framed, (PS)

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Provenance:
Private Collection, Germany

Literature:
Jürgen Harten (ed.), Gerhard Richter - Bilder/Paintings 1962–1985, with catalogue raisonné by Dietmar Elger, Cologne 1986, catalogue raisonné no. 338/86, ill. p. 163 Hubertus Butin, Stefan Gronert, Gerhard Richter Editionen 1965–2004, Ostfildern-Ruit 2004, no. 50, p. 190 (ill. of another ex.)

“My paintings are bereft of an object; but similar to objects they are themselves objectified. This makes them without content, meaningless and pointless like objects or trees, animals, human beings or days that exist and persist without purpose or goal. It is all about this quality. (Nevertheless, there are a good and bad pictures.)“(1)
(1) Gerhard Richter. Text 1961 bis 2007. Schriften, Interviews, Briefe, Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne, 2008, p. 133

Producing Rot-Blau-Gelb in 1973, Richter suspended one hundred identically sized canvases side-by-side to create one large surface upon which he used a single broad brush to trace in endless streaks of paint traversing the canvas the three primary colours red, blue and yellow, until the shades lost their uniqueness to blend into a uniform complexion. All that remained visible was a congealed gestural stroke of the brush following no evident comprehensible system, elevating the mere belts of seemingly braided paint to become the content of the image. The movements appeared to start nowhere, and end nowhere, while refusing to obey any traceable rhythm.(2)

Afterwards, the one hundred individual pieces were separated and sold individually, thus stripping away the experience of any harmonious composition within the overall piece, laying bare the doubt and scepticism that Richter felt toward any objective reality underlying the phenomena around us.

Displacing each coincidently re-emerging snippet of the entire picture within a different context has sweeping consequences: details suddenly acquire a prominent position within the inner working of the painting, exerting influence through their shifting dimensions and new framing.

This phenomenon is particularly apparent in the work shown here if one considers how the continuous brushstroke in the lower third of the image now seems drawn to the foreground. Hence, each excerpt represents an aesthetically ‘valid’ painting that discovers its own individual character thanks to the superimposed, criss-crossing tracks etched into the paint.(3)
(2) see catalogue raisonné Butin p. 34
(3) see catalogue raisonné Butin p.35