Love clarity? Love chaos? Gerhard Richter's artwork intersects these two poles—he is recognised as one of the most significant influential artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Richter's work contains mesmerisingly particular photorealistic paintings as well as works driven by squeegeeing chaos through an emotive lens, then pulls it away and drops it into a free-falling abyss of colour. Richter refuses to be categorised in any one style of painting; he mastered realism, destroyed it, then redefined abstract painting altogether.
Richter's progression from early figurative works to mammoth canvases that feel like fractal explosions of color has engaged collectors, critics, and curators globally. Richter's work is now entrenched in the best collections worldwide, exhibited retrospectives; and sales at blue chip auctions. Richter's artworks are some of the most coveted of contemporary art history.
Peruse authenticated Gerhard Richter artwork — collectable edition artwork through to major works — and become part of an artist's legacy that continues to reinvent what painting can be.
About Gerhard Richter
Gerhard Richter was born in Dresden, Germany, in 1932. Before becoming a world-renowned artist, Richter's career included learning the formally unofficial style of Socialist Realism in East Germany. In 1961 - with the impending Berlin Wall - Richter moved to West Germany, and this forced move significantly altered the landscape of his work, which was then exposed to new socially and culturally avant-garde movements like Fluxus and Pop Art.
Richter has fluidly moved between different styles over the last sixty years while still maintaining a portfolio of work that includes paintings in the styles of photorealism, abstraction, colour charts, and unrelated glass-stained windows. Richter's work is inseparable from curated exhibitions at MoMA, Tate Modern and Centre Pompidou, and he practices as one of the most important voices in post-war and contemporary art.
Few artists have made their mark in art history with an abundance of work and a virulent condemnation of embracing a single “style.”
Iconic Series and Artworks
Gerhard Richter's Abstraktes Bild series not only changed the conversation about abstraction, it erased it. These enormous canvases, saturated with colour and made using Richter's now-famous squeegee technique, represent the postmodern rejection of style as identity. No two are alike, yet each retains the unmistakable Richter stamp of chaos, control and a kind of violent elegance. One of these paintings, Abstraktes Bild (1986) managed to break the record for highest price at auction for an artwork when it went for over $46 million at Sotheby's, suggesting that Richter's abstractions are not 'background' paintings in any sense.
There is Betty (1988)- a quietly subversive portrait of his daughter turned away from the viewer, blurry enough to reside somewhere between a photograph and memory. One of his most reproduced images and yet one of his most enigmatic, a portrait without a face.
Richter's 1982 painting Candle is vastly different from the abstraction of Betty- a stark, meditative image of a single candle flame suspended in the dark. The photorealism is so clear that it approaches simulation, and yet the image has the emotional pull of a Zurbarán still life. It is, in the end, about time, silence and everything flickering in between.
And there is Seascape (Slightly Cloudy) (1969)- hyper-real and yet entirely invented. A fictional view of the ocean, echoing more of a memory than a sight. Richter made it from multiple photographs piecing together the unidealized. And exactly as before, he is not showing us reality; he is showing us how we instantiate reality.
Richter's Cathedral Square, Milan (1968), part of his love of photography and early series of photo-paintings, freezes a fleeting moment in an unobtrusive blur that imitates camera shake; the bridge between journalism and oil paint. Richter is a reporter who with reporters' indifference, obscures our daily lives.
In 2014 he returned to history with the Birkenau series, inspired by found photographs smuggled from Auschwitz. What began as representational paintings ultimately resulted in heavily abstracted paintings that buried the original images in layered paint. These are not erasure, but transformation. A meditative space on trauma and the impossibility of representation in the face of horror.
While there are some artists who decide to lean into spectacle, Richter leans into doubt. His work does not shout, it haunts. Whether smeared abstraction, clinical realism or archival distortion, they orbit the same Richter obsession: truth, memory and the tenuous surface between seeing and suggesting.
Artistic Techniques and Themes
Richter's practice is characterised by oppositional terms - figuration and abstraction, distortion and documentation. His photorealistic works are based on images from found and personal photographs, which he blurs to his known effect, creating an ambiguity of emotional distance. Importantly, this is not about memory; it is about how we remember.
His abstract works constitute a physical action in paint, created by dragging squeegees across layers of colours. This unpredictability of process, incompletely controlled for Richter is half-will and half-decay, providing a crucial tension in much of Richter's work.
Common themes in Richter's practice are history, war, grief, perception, and the slippery nature of truth vs. image. Richter does not provide answers; rather, his work allows for space to be filled with questions.
Art Market and Investment
Gerhard Richter is not only a critical darling, but he is also an art market behemoth. Richter's works at auctions often realise millions, including Abstraktes Bild (1986), which generated over $46 million in 2015. Even his editions and works on paper receive solid secondary-market interest and are trending upward consistently.
Richter is not only an important art historical figure but remains in continual institutional relevance through his positioning within prestige institutions, and critics' support, which means that demand for his works remains high. Proven, reliable, authoritatively sourced Richter works demonstrate validity for the wider global contemporary art market and between contributor and curator. Whether in collectable editions or in 'museum-grade' pieces, Richter delivers art historical prestige.
Authenticity and Provenance
In a market as serious as this, authenticity is vital. All Gerhard Richter works should be accompanied by certificates of authenticity, detailing provenance through respected galleries, auction houses, or the artist's official catalogue raisonné.
Given the complexity and high value of his market, it is crucial to buy from verified origins. In our curated collection of Richter works we ensure that every work is checked for by the team to confirm its provenance and authenticity to offer collectors and investors full confidence.
Browse our curated selection and appreciate why Gerhard Richter is regarded as one of the most respected and collected artists in the world.