OFFER THEMED TOURS

on ART and PHILOSOPHY

Guided themed tour with Martina Sauer at Museum Frieder Burda, Unfolding Color. Simon Hantaï (up to January 10, 2027) Photo: 13.8.2026

A book project by Simon Hantaï, realized in collaboration with Jacques Derrida and Jean-Luc Nancy: Le Toucher, limited special edition,

Paris: Galilée, 2000

Thematic focus:

How and what do color and form evoke in us?

How does abstraction come about? Do abstract images still convey any meaning at all, and if so, what?

With around 40 often monumental masterpieces, the Frieder Burda Museum is presenting its first retrospective exhibition of the Hungarian artist Simon Hantaï.

After emigrating from Hungary to Paris in 1948, the artist drew inspiration from Surrealism and Informel. Aspects of Conceptual Art and Minimal Art are also evident in his work.

As a philosopher of art and culture, I am particularly fascinated by the extent to which his exchange with the postmodern philosopher Jacques Derrida became significant for him. After all, parallels can be drawn between Derrida’s concept of the “trace”—and thus the connection between past, present, and future that we humans can experience physically and emotionally—and Hantaï’s work.

What abstract art can achieve and the deeper meaning Hantaï seeks to express through it are the focus of the guided tours led by the philosopher of art and culture Martina Sauer.

*For further reading on this topic, see Martina Sauer’s publications available for free download: (1.) the essay on postmodernism and Derrida and (2.) the doctoral dissertation on The Genesis of Abstraction:

(2020) What is reality? Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, Judith Butler, and the artist Karin Kneffel on the deconstruction of the familiar as liberation from determination. In: Martina Sauer (ed.) On the Postmodern Age [Art Style 6]: 101–120.

(1999/2000) Cézanne—van Gogh—Monet. The Genesis of Abstraction, doctoral dissertation under Gottfried Boehm, University of Basel, Switzerland, 1989. 2nd ed. 2014, Heidelberg: arthistoricum.net.

Photo: HAUS KIEFER, Anselm Kiefer. Noch nicht (Ernst Bloch). 1974. Watercolor and pen on paper, 23,3 x 32 cm

Thematic Focus:

(with security staff outside regular opening hours)

In Search of What Defines Humanity in General and Human Existence in Relationships

What themes does Anselm Kiefer expresses through his watercolors and books? Do they differ from his large-format mixed-media paintings and installations?

Those were my initial questions as I explored the new exhibition at HAUS KIEFER. The museum is located on the Rhine near the border with Alsace(France) in Ottersdorf (Rastatt), a place that shaped his youth. The building was acquired by the artist and opened in 2025.

It became clear to me that, from the very beginning of his artistic career—and thus as early as the 1960s—watercolor and its “objectification” in books have accompanied his work. Through his watercolor paintings, he consistently takes up themes that—as a supposed “connoisseur” of his early work extending into the 1980s—namely the body of work I have summarized in numerous publications as Deutschlandbilder—surprised me and yet, in a way, did not.

For upon encountering them, it becomes clear once again that it is fundamental questions about one’s own existence (“essence and existence”) and those concerning human beings as men or women—and the interrelationship between them—that Anselm Kiefer addresses in this latest exhibition he has curated, focusing on watercolors and books.

His reflection on power and powerlessness within the respective role models struck me with respect. A Kiefer who was previously “unknown” to me addresses profound problems in our society through his works in this exhibition.

Just how important this theme is to him is also evident in his current exhibition in Milan at the Palazzo Reale, which runs through September 27, 2026. Titled “Alchemists,” the exibition features over 40 monumental paintings made of lead, ash, straw, and earth that commemorate forgotten women in science and alchemy.

For more on Anselm Kiefer’s “Deutschlandbilder”, see, Martina Sauer’s book on the artist—which was awarded the Hans and Lea Grundig Prize for Theory by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation: Faszination und Schrecken. Zur Handlungsrelevanz ästhetischer Erfahrung anhand Anselm Kiefers “Deutschlandbilder” [1st ed. 2012]. Heidelberg: Arthistoricum 2018 (free download)