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Socialist Realism meets the surreal

Neo Rauch puts a twist on the communist era's enforced style
Gallery Review | Search restaurants | Archives

By Tony Ozuna
For The Prague Post
May 23rd, 2007 issue

COURTESY IMAGE
Mom, there's a cannon in our yard! Rauch puts an absurdist spin on communist-era orthodoxy.
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Neo Rauch: Neue Rollen

at Galerie Rudolfinum Ends Aug. 5. Alšovo nábř. 12, Prague 1–Old Town. Open Tues.–Sun. 10 a.m.–6 p.m.

The majority of Neo Rauch’s canvases throughout his exhibit “Neue Rollen — Paintings From 1993 to the Present Day” are grand, or at least executed on a grand scale. And most of them seem to be both a nod and a stick in the eye to Socialist Realism.
Rauch, born in 1960 in Leipzig, became phenomenally successful on the international art market a few years ago. He is part of the “New Leipzig School,” which centers around the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig, where he studied under Arno Rink along with fellow East Germans Martin Eder and David Schnell.
The exhibition begins with huge works from 1993. These are mainly abstracts, identifiable by their rough, two-toned variations and surrealistic or realistic details. The largest piece, Plazenta, a circular work with a diameter of 340 centimeters (11 feet), is the centerpiece; it is a black-and-white oil painting on paper, cut into four quarters under thick glass. The figures on paper resemble scientists in a lab, and there are bombers in one circle on the side.
In the gallery’s second room, the works are scaled down in size but not necessarily in concept. These works are more technical, with precisely painted buildings juxtaposed with threatening or chaotic images.
Das Haus (1996) is a painting of men constructing a building, while above them an overpowering black sky looms like an ominous forest. In Baver (2002), medieval monks observing worms in a field meet up with men of the modern age in a collision of histories.
Placed in a small side room, In Messe (1999) has men appearing to stand at attention to statues of workers. This is the first glimpse of Rauch’s altered vision of Socialist Realism: communist workers with a twist of absurdity, though still solemn in their endeavors and often set against surreal backgrounds.
In all of the works, Rauch’s colors are toned down. The muted colors belong to another era, the socialist era, and the figures and buildings are painted in a style to fit the atmosphere that the colors evoke. Yet there are always odd surrealistic or even sci-fi additions, as in Regel (2000), where two little men are fighting with sticks, martial-arts style, while another little man is pushing himself out of a circular mirror and more prominent figures are engaged in both serious and absurd activities. Overall the effect is unsettling, but in a good way.
Other standouts in the main salon include Auftrieb (2003), in which a mountain goat exits a cellar from a slope at the edge of a forest. The animal is being pulled out by a woman as two farmers stand beside her, one firmly holding a red baseball bat. All the figures are dressed in 1950s socialist-era clothing, and the black sky above them is demarcated by a powerful flash of lightning, with a wedge of clear sky pushing itself into the scene.
In Lieferrung (2002), a gigantic black beast that looks like a cat with the body of a mammoth pulls a farmer and his wagon, which is laden with large containers. This image could be from a film by Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki — except that it’s set on an industrialized farm in East Germany. In Korinthische Orduung (2003), a giant red cannon in a field is pressed up against an iconic image of Germans at a summer camp; one man is in a military uniform, while children beside him play with huge spinning tops that resemble UFOs.
In See (2000), a man and woman are at the shores of a lake handling a gigantic octopus, while another worker beside them holds a white arrow into the ground. Poles of various shapes rise beside them like alien intruders.
The last two rooms contain Rauch’s most powerful works. In Abstraktion (2005) and Aufstand (2004), the communists seem to be present in full force, with men who resemble Lenin and other workers wearing classic socialist attire. Here, more than ever, Rauch is mimicking Socialist Realism with a vengeance. Engaged in absurd activities, the workers are all out of place or out of step with reality, and usually immersed in some Dadaistic scene.
In Konspiration (2004), there are details such as two green garden gnomes with menacing (even though they’re wrapped in pink) gazes that make them look almost like serpents. Interview (2006) recalls Goethe (or at least his era) beside men dressed in tacky 1970s disco clothes. The group of men is having a tragic night in surreal environs.
Rauch portrays an absurd modernity that is a confounding experience. In his vision, Socialist Realism isn’t dead — its calm insanity lives on. He understands it and grasps its beauty and ugliness, its function and futility, all together and über alles.

Tony Ozuna can be reached at features@praguepost.com


Other articles in Night & Day (23/05/2007):

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