KERSTIN BRÄTSCH

Over the past ten years, the painter Kerstin Brätsch has created an impressive oeuvre that is as varied as it is rigorous. Her work proceeds from an expanded definition of painting – in addition to large-scale oil paintings (usually on paper), she has also painted on polyester film, created images on glass, painted using a marbling technique, and delved into performance art. In her work, Kerstin Brätsch engages with themes central to the history of painting, such as portraiture and certain methods of abstraction. At the same time, however, her work reflects on the challenges digital technology poses to the legitimacy of the painting medium. Not unlike the way digital images circulate, Brätsch’s own images are continuously mutable; clearly conscious of the pressures the medium of painting faces today, she submits them to ‘stress tests’ via special types of display or performances in urban spaces. In this tension between traditional and contemporary forms of images, Kerstin Brätsch seeks relevant and personal artistic expression. Throughout the process, she has held closely to painting and its history, testing its resilience from the inside out.

With approximately 80 works, this will be the first major museum showing of the art of Kerstin Brätsch, who currently resides in New York. The exhibition in the Museum Brandhorst will be accompanied by the first monograph on Kerstin Brätsch’s work.