(born Brooklyn, New York in 1927)
Summer Trees, signed, dated Alex Katz 07 (incised), oil on cardboard, 30.5 x 22.8 cm, framed, (PS)

The subject of the landscape – not a natural landscape, but as a metaphorical dimension – is a constant theme in Alex Katz’s oeuvre.
“Almost every summer I paint a landscape. I work with the idea of a landscape, with the idea of painting a landscape ‘bar any scenery’. I am occupied with the idea of elaborating on details or excerpts to form complete paintings, and to see a landscape differently, in a certain way. I asked myself, can you paint such an empty painting, and still have it look like a tangible landscape?
(Alex Katz in Jerry Saltz: Alex Katz – Cool School, Flash art, Vol XXIV no. 159, 1991, p.106) Katz uses observations of nature as an optional territory for representing various associations and constellations of reality like a form of prevailing mood, using it as a means of approaching social or political issues.

The painter is interested in interpretations of the contents of paintings, but these are not the aim of his painting: “the external appearances alter, and it is right to present a new subject in a new style. The central value of the new (newly seen) subject and the new style assigns the work to a particular time and makes it easy to identify its period.”
Season, time of day, temperature and, in some way, even the location, can be determined by the light, lending the trees a certain hue. At the same time, the style – the formal solution – enables the painter to condense the appearance into a visual essence, giving the viewer the freedom to interpret the painting in their own way, one in which psychological, social and political components may play a role. (Cf. Margrit Brehm: Von Natur aus Kunst, in: Alex Katz, American Landscape, Baden Baden 1995, p.44f.)