Gunter Umberg: Body of Painting: Pictures from Cologne-based Collections

For Body of Painting, Gnter Umberg has placed his own oeuvre within the context of images by other artists with whom he feels a special affinity. The other artists featured include Jasper Johns, Sigmar Polke, Ellsworth Kelly, Yves Klein, Jessica Stockholder, Gerhard Richter, Brice Marden, Robert Ryman, Piero Manzoni, Andy Warhol, Jo Baer, Ingrid Calame, Helmut Federle, Dan Flavin, Sam Francis, Hans Hoffman, Oskar Kokoschka, Jonathan Lasker, and David Reed, among others. Together, these works create a discursive dialogue which allows viewers to grasp relationships of both harmony and discord among a multiplicitous network of texts, with surprising and engaging results. Umberg's own pieces can definitely be counted among the many highlights of this collection--his paintings break the bounds of the visible; they form imaginary fields of extreme openness whose velvety blackness both envelops and releases the viewer.