Markus Lüpertz : The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC

“To explain nature and what surrounds us was and is painting’s mandate and is the reason I make the effort.”—Markus Lüpertz

One of the most important post-World War II artists in Germany, Markus Lüpertz helped chronicle and shape the postwar image of his country, achieving enormous success across Europe. Astonishingly, this is his first major museum retrospective in the United States. This exhibition, organized in close collaboration with the artist himself, explores his five-decade career, from his earliest works—the perplexing “dithyrambs” and provocative manipulations of German motifs, such as helmets and fields of wheat—to the more recent paintings that are redolent with mythological subject matter and art historical allusions.