Anselm Kiefer

"Ruins, for me, are the beginning. With the debris, you can construct new ideas." Anselm Kiefer

Anselm Kiefer is a prolific visual artist. In his decades-long career, he has created countless paintings, installations, sculptures, prints, and photographs, often incorporating material such as lead, clay, and ash into his finished works. A lifelong resident of Germany, he draws inspiration from the history and culture of Europe. He often revisits the same material — say, a wheat field — over and over, so his work becomes a sort of historical record in itself, showing how something can come into being, pass away, and rise again. This is a theme of Kiefer’s work: Everything comes from something, and sometimes ruins are, in fact, just the beginning.