Ahead of Hong Kong exhibitions, German artist Anselm Kiefer on his ‘cynical but hopeful’ art that evokes the Holocaust and other painful histories

Anselm Kiefer, who captures the zeitgeist with themes of decay and chaos, has two Hong Kong shows opening this week, at the Gagosian and Villepin galleries

The exhibitions focus on landscapes tainted by the past, and hint at a ‘hopeful’ future. The artist, and gallerist Dominique de Villepin, share their thoughts

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Anselm Kiefer’s two upcoming Hong Kong shows focus on painful histories and the passage of time. The German artist, and gallerist and French former politician Dominique de Villepin, give their takes on the art. Photo: Getty Images

Enid Tsui

Published: 4:15pm, 16 May 2023Updated: 1:11pm, 17 May 2023

Corrected [1:07pm, 17 May, 2023]

[1:07pm, 17 May, 2023]
Villepin changed its public opening times for Anselm Kiefer's solo exhibition "Golden Age" after this story was originally published. The times have been updated in the story.

It seems the world can’t get enough of Anselm Kiefer’s terrifying vision.

In spring 2022, the German artist’s colossal evocations of past cataclysms and the unrelenting cycles of history temporarily supplanted the ancient frescoes glorifying victories in battle in a vast chamber inside the Palazzo Ducale in Venice.

The title of the exhibition conveyed the desolate effects of the floor-to-ceiling spectacle: “These Writings, When Burned, Will Finally Give Some Light”.

Kiefer’s vast landscapes, thick with impasto and embedded with burned books and other detritus, were of scenes ravaged by fire and water. In one, a viewer gazing up from a scorched field of dead branches and barbed wire would be met with the sight of a coffin nailed to the canvas, hovering in the sky.

Kiefer in his studio in Croissy, on the outskirts of Paris. Photo: Georges Poncet

This month, a feature-length documentary about the artist will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Its director, Wim Wenders, promises an immersive telling of the 78-year-old’s life story and his art, starting from his birth in Germany at the end of World War II. Unlike an earlier 2010 film about Kiefer by Sophie Fiennes, this one is in 3D.

“That’s why I can’t come to Hong Kong. I have to attend the screening,” the artist says via video link from his studio on the outskirts of Paris.