Art Basel Highlights at Ely House at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, London

Jun 16 to Jul 31, 2020

All images courtesy of Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac and the artist

Highlights include a new and never previously exhibited sculpture by Jack Pierson, a new painting by Georg Baselitz, and an early photograph by Sigmar Polke, taken during his travels to Afghanistan and Pakistan where he shot one of his most important photographic series. Featured artists include:

GEORG BASELITZ | ROSEMARIE CASTORO | TONY CRAGG | ANTONY GORMLEY | DONALD JUDD| IMI KNOEBEL | ROBERT LONGO | JACK PIERSON | SIGMAR POLKE | DAVID SALLE | RAQIB SHAW | EMILIO VEDOVA | ERWIN WURM | YAN PEI-MING

Also on view at the gallery will be a monumental painting by Anselm Kiefer, Memento mori (2020) from his new series Für Walther von der Vogelweide and referencing the theory and practice of reflecting on the transient nature of earthly life. Placed at the top of the canvas, separating the sky from the impasto of golden paint that suggests a wheat field, the scythe underlines the symbolic meaning of the work. Anselm Kiefer’s ongoing preoccupation with cultural memory, identity and history lends his works their multi-layered and complex iconography, constantly fuelled by a canon of historical, mythological and literary sources. In a process of reworking, combining and accumulating, the artist weaves personal biography, collective memory and symbolically charged materiality into a deeply personal work complex that is nevertheless anchored in the communal psyche. Following in the tradition of German landscape painting, Kiefer often uses depictions of nature to explore the fundamental questions of human existence. In many cases, he combines these with objects applied to the canvas, which contain a variety of symbolic references of varying intensity.

© the artists. Courtesy Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, London • Paris • Salzburg. Photo: Ben Westoby