Anselm Kiefer quotes

Anselm Kiefer is a German painter and sculptor known for his monumental works exploring themes of history and memory. His art often incorporates unusual materials such as lead, ash, and straw to evoke the trauma and legacy of World War II and the Holocaust. He is regarded as one of the most significant contemporary artists addressing Germany’s past and cultural identity. Here are 41 of his quotes:

This time during the Second World War is part of my history, part of my memory, but it is the latest part of my memory, so the memories of each human being goes much more back, it goes to the dinosaurs, even later [Kiefer means: earlier].. .. I think we even remember geological times. So this is one little part of our / of mine memory [the Second World War].

Anselm Kiefer

There is a reciprocal action between the work of art and the viewer. The river changes the work of art and criticism can also change the artist.. .There are so many ideas afloat; any of them could have triggered the work of art. It is impossible to determine exactly if the idea has been transmitted by the critic, or if the work itself has determined its outcome..

Anselm Kiefer

I am only able to do what stirs me. I want to perceive with my senses things which at the moment are not generally perceived. I do not share, as yet, Beuys' consciousness or hope that all people are moving to a certain point where they all become artists. I am of the opinion that there are artists and non-artists. I think that this is the way it always was and always will be. I do not believe that we are in the center of the world. It is possible that there are gods who do not relate to human. As an artist, I believe that it is possible to depict these forces. I know it sounds absurd when I say that man can perceive some things and adumbrate powers, which do not relate to him. But perhaps the artist, unlike the non-artist, is able to do just that.

Anselm Kiefer

I want to say something about Picasso as a revolutionary. A revolution in the history of art is a reflection of the history of society. Art cannot revolutionize society. It is a reflection of that revolution.. You [= Joseph Beuys ] talking in the same interview] have revolutionized art. But I do not see that you have revolutionized society directly. You have depicted what has not yet existed.. ..art and life are not two separate realms, but they have shifted out of phase with each other.

Anselm Kiefer

What interests me is the transformation, not the monument. I don't construct ruins, but I feel ruins are moments when things show themselves. A ruin is not a catastrophe. It is the moment when things can start again.

Anselm Kiefer

The Germans always had difficulties with their identity. Either it was too much and too loud, or it was hidden and too subservient. The French always had a healthy self-confidence. When they spoke of a 'grande nation' it was not dangerous. De Gaulle could say on Martinique: 'Behind me is the ocean. In front of me is France'.

Anselm Kiefer

What does the artist do? He draws connections. He ties the invisible threads between things. He dives into history, be it the history of mankind, the geological history of the Earth or the beginning and end of the manifest cosmos.

Anselm Kiefer

Ruins, for me, are the beginning. With the debris, you can construct new ideas. They are symbols of a beginning.

Anselm Kiefer

History is formed by the people, those who have power and those without power. Each one of us makes history.

Anselm Kiefer

I perceive existentialism as a necessity of decision. This is the essential aspect of existentialism and simultaneously the most subversive factor..

Anselm Kiefer

In 1968 the end of art was announced, but this was for political reasons and for the wrong reasons. At that time it was believed that as long as there were only formal relationships, one did not have to deal with a luxury such as art.

Anselm Kiefer

Perspective and Impressionism were tentative attempts to deal with the world of appearance because of a fear to look inside. Cubism is structure and order. Now both epidermis and order are no longer possible.... The accidental aspects of Impressionist composition are to be understood as a reaction. And the reaction of Cézanne is to be seen as a response to Impressionism. One cannot simply disregard Impressionism. As a dialectic antithesis it was important. The Impressionists had the idea of dissolution; they wanted to represent light, not bodies and not shadows, but light for itself. Frequently I find this tedious, but there is an idea behind it: Atomization is a modern idea..

Anselm Kiefer

I do not believe that there is an external element to be disrupted now. The situation is different from the period of the Dadaists. There is nothing to overthrow now, because everything has been co-opted. To be subversive now in the sense of Dadaism would be reactionary, because now it would be the attitude of model students..

Anselm Kiefer

Why have our standards fallen so low? Why do we have all these ugly things which nobody needs? Industrial manufacture and new materials have led to truly unlimited possibilities of forms. There are no longer any natural constraints which depend on materials such as wood and stone. We simply manufacture everything that is technically possible and lack new structures on which to base our decisions.

Anselm Kiefer

Until the artist is dead, we are not able to determine his work in all its dimensions.

Anselm Kiefer

What fascinates me about Duchamp is the idea of tearing down the wall between the art object and reality.

Anselm Kiefer

When I went to school [art-school - Joseph Beuys was one of his art teachers and a very inspiring one] there was Pop Art. The Americans dismissed us from our responsibilities. They mailed us Care packages and Democracy. The search for our own identity was postponed. After the 'time of misfortune' as it has been called euphemistically, one thought in 1946 to begin anew. Even now we talk about the 'Point Zero'. But that is not possible; this is nonsense. The past is tabulated because to confront it would necessitate denial and disgust..

Anselm Kiefer

I grew up in a forest. It's like a room. It's protected. Like a cathedral... it is a place between heaven and earth.

Anselm Kiefer

Mondrian began with his paintings of the seashore, with blue trees and the cathedral. These paintings were totally symbolist paintings.. .Until the very end Mondrian remains a Symbolist and an Expressionist.

Anselm Kiefer

[on becoming an artist] It is my profession, yes [ to be an artist] but a calling.. that a little bit pathetic, a little bit bombastic. I think it was much more natural.. .I Thought – when I was a child – the only method to be not in the world but outside of the world is to be an artist. I feel me outside, yes..

Anselm Kiefer

I used my self, my body [in his art] as an instrument.. ..not only my body but also my spirit.. ..as an instrument to research something.

Anselm Kiefer

[referring to his painting 'Everyone Stands under His Own Dome of Heaven' (1971): It is a man in his own universe. It [the painting] was a quotation of, taken out of Robert Musil's novel 'Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften'; how do you translate it in English? 'The Man without qualities', I think – the most important book of the 20th century I would say. So this is a quotation: Jeder Mensch soll nach seine Himmel gucken.. .. I meant there is no objective truth. So as I discovered later, there is no objective history. There is no history; each human being made its own history – has his own thoughts and his own world. And sometimes two domes touch each other, or cross each other, but everyone is alone with its own illusions and methods..

Anselm Kiefer