Max Neumann - Death is blind

I first learned about Max Neumann during an internship at Galerie Maeght in Paris. Neumann is an artist represted by the gallery and has done some quite dark prints and lithographs for the gallery's collection. He is also included in a book collection named Carnet de Voyage,published by the gallery's affliated press, Maeght Éditeur.

The paintings of this German artist instantly arouses both fear and discomfort. Neumann's prolific use of black represents figures which cannot be recognized as human or animal, and which provoke fear of the unknown.

‘IT’S AS THOUGH YOU’D LIKE TO SPEAK, BUT HAVE NO language.’ These are the words chosen by German painter Max Neumann to describe his earliest—and perhaps deepest—impulse to create. For nearly half a century, Neumann has laboured to develop, refine, and elaborate a visual vocabulary that is dark, obsessive and intense.

Though long celebrated across much of Europe, Neumann’s work has only in recent years penetrated the Anglophone world. The success of his most recent collaborations—with László Krasznahorkai on their chapbook animalinside (2010), and with the US journal music & literature (2012)—testify to the universal appeal of Neumann’s howling, primal language.

http://www.maxneumann.com/index/1