Georg Baselitz: Time for New Heroes

16 May 2026 Kunstmuseum Schloss Derneburg

Georg Baselitz. Maler im Mantel - drei Streifen (from portfolio Remix '65/’66), 2008 © Georg Baselitz 2026
Conceived as a revolving presentation of prints by the acclaimed German artist, this initial exhibition includes approximately seventy woodcuts and etchings created between 1964 and 2008 supplemented by examples in painting and drawing.
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Kunstmuseum Schloss Derneburg is pleased to announce the exhibition, Georg Baselitz: Time for New Heroes, opening on 16 May 2026. Conceived as a revolving presentation of prints by the acclaimed German artist, this initial exhibition includes approximately seventy woodcuts and etchings created between 1964 and 2008 supplemented by examples in painting and drawing. Beginning with core motifs found in Baselitz's solitary New Types and Hero-figures of the 1960s and masterfully refined in print across six decades, Time for New Heroes exemplifies the breadth of his innovation in technique, scale, and color. On the occasion of this exhibition, Kunstmuseum Schloss Derneburg will re-open the lower level of the so-called "New Studio," where Baselitz produced prints for a decade, complementing the ongoing exhibition Baselitz in the Studio installed in the building's main level.
Baselitz in his print studio, located in the lower level of the "New Studio". Derneburg, November 9, 2004. Photograph: Martin Müller. Artwork: Georg Baselitz © 2026

In an interview with Ulrich Weisner conducted in Derneburg on 22 August 1989, Baselitz recalled "I always made woodcuts right when the urgent need arose to refine an image, an idea of an image, that I had developed and that was manifested in paintings - to precisely refine that image's idea into a final form." Though initially heralded as a painter, Baselitz maintained an unusual commitment to developing form fluidly between painting, drawing, sculpture and printmaking, melding the processes and challenges inherent to each medium as a way of informing his overall practice. By pursuing the historically rich, perennially outdated, and technically difficult craft of etchings and woodcuts, Baselitz has positioned himself as a prolific contemporary outsider within a historical lineage that includes Albrecht Dürer, Pontormo, the School of Fontainebleau, and Edvard Munch. With each exercise and with each innovation, Baselitz illustrates a lifelong fidelity to printmaking and a Sisyphean commitment towards an elusive 'final form.'
Georg Baselitz. Ohne Titel (Typ)/Grüner am Baum, 1965. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

During a two-month residency at Schloss Wolfsburg in 1964, Baselitz first produced a series of intimately sized soft ground etchings that clarified his core motifs. Comprised of lines both soft and rough, the fallen and disheveled figures that populated the zinc plates he produced the following year were critically named the 'heroes'. In Untitled (Typ)/Grüner am Baum (1965), an isolated man wearing torn clothing holds a wide stance with outstretched arms within a desolated landscape.
Georg Baselitz. Maler im Mantel - drei Streifen (from portfolio Remix '65/'66), 2008. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

In the series Remix '65/66 (2008), Baselitz references his early prints in title and motif, with paper painted in synthetic tones that provides an energized ground for a negative image. In Maler im Mantel - drei Streifen (2008), a close cropping to the figure and a misalignment of form at the waist recalls Baselitz's so-called Fracture pictures - the compositional element he developed in 1966 which led ultimately to his turning the motive on its head.
Georg Baselitz. Der neue Typ, 1966. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

Early woodcuts that Baselitz made in his home and studio in Osthofen after moving from Berlin, including Der neue Typ (1966), are examples of his first attempts at the negative cutting technique, illustrated by a hulking figure printed in brown against a background of sinuous lines. After his residency at the Villa Romana in 1965, Baselitz intensified his interest in 16^th century Mannerist prints and techniques, drawing inspiration from the light and dark elements of 'chiaroscuro' woodcuts.
Georg Baselitz. 32 Punkte, 1991. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

Initially in 1977 and again during the 1990s, Baselitz engaged in the intense, physical labor of scaling his motifs. 32 Punkte (1991), a 2-meter tall woodcut, rivals in size the artist's paintings of that time while maintaining a sense of the block's grain within the green background. Using a second block to overlay additions in black, Baselitz cut his image directly into the wood without a preparatory drawing.
Georg Baselitz. Ein Roter (Remix), 2005. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

In the painting Ein Roter (Remix) (2005), an open-mouthed, distraught, uniformed figure dressed in red and within a mostly red field mirrors the limited color blocks of traditional prints, while the white border perhaps mirrors surrounding paper margins. Drastically different in scale, the dry point etching Der neue Typ (2006) cyclically returns the uniformed 'hero' with extended arms to much thinner, overlapping lines, brought forward over a vibrant, yellow tinted background.
Georg Baselitz. Der neue Typ (from portfolio Remix), 2006. Hall Collection. Courtesy Hall Art Foundation © Georg Baselitz 2026

One of the most important German artists of the post-war period, Hans-Georg Kern was born in 1938 in the Saxon village of Deutschbaselitz. In 1961 he adopted the name Georg Baselitz in homage to his birthplace. Baselitz has exhibited his work internationally for decades. Major solo presentations include a retrospective organized by the Guggenheim Museum, New York, that traveled to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C., the Nationalgalerie Berlin (1995-96) followed by a major show at Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (1996). Baselitz's Remix cycle was first presented at the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich (2006), and the Albertina, Vienna (2007), the same year as his retrospective at the Royal Academy of Arts, London (2007). A comprehensive survey of Baselitz's sculptures was held at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2011 - 2012), followed by solo exhibitions at the Albertina, Vienna (2013), and Haus der Kunst, Munich (2014). Baselitz's Heldenbilder (Hero Paintings) and Neue Typen (New Types) were shown at the Städel Museum, Frankfurt (2016), travelling to the Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome; and Guggenheim Bilbao. In 2018, comprehensive solo exhibitions were held at the Fondation Beyeler, Basel; Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C.; and Musée Unterlinden, Colmar, France. Most recently, important solo exhibitions of his work have been presented at Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice, Italy (2019), Centre Pompidou, Paris, France (2021-22), Museo di Palazzo Grimani, Venice, Italy (2021-22), The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY (2022), Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (2023), Serpentine Gallery, London (2023), Sakıp Sabancı Museum, Istanbul (2024), KODE Bergen and at Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao (2025), Museo Novecento, Florence (2026), and MdM Salzburg (2026). Baselitz lives and works between two different locations: Lake Ammersee in Bavaria, near Salzburg, Austria and in Imperia, Italy. His works can be found in institutional collections around the world.

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Georg Baselitz. Der neue Typ (from portfolio Remix), 2006 © Georg Baselitz 2026
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