[Lee Jong-gil's Autumn Return] The Tragedy of Richter Seen in the Collapse of the Human World

Jurgen Schreiber 'A Family Drama'

Gerhard Richter, Germany's Representative Contemporary Artist... Illuminating a Tragic Family History Amid the Turbulent German History

Not a Simple Art Historical Approach but a Personal Drama

From 'Mrs. Heide' Painted from a Photograph to Reflecting His Own Story in Paintings

'Aunt Marianne,' a Victim of Nazi Euthanasia, and 'Father-in-law Oeppinger,' a Nazi Party Member

Revealing the Collapse of the Human World through the Connection of Subjects

The German film Author Unknown (2018) features various paintings. Footprints in multiple directions on a blonde background. White circles of uniform size on a black canvas. These are works by Kurt Warnert (played by Tom Schilling). He escaped from East Germany, where he painted socialist propaganda, to West Germany. He enrolled at the D?sseldorf Art Academy seeking new possibilities. However, his mentor showed little reaction to his works.

"'I think, therefore I am.' Ren? Descartes questioned everything. Everything could be illusion, deception, or imagination. But there must be something to have such thoughts. So ultimately, something exists. He decided to call that something 'self.' But who are you? What are you? This is not you."

Warnert is a colored character based on Gerhard Richter, Germany's leading contemporary artist. Richter crossed over to West Germany just before the Berlin Wall was erected. He never advanced at the D?sseldorf Art Academy. He worked under the credo of capitalist realism but faced failure repeatedly. He could not honestly express the emotions boiling inside his heart.

J?rgen Schreiber's A Family Drama sheds light on Richter's life. It is not an art historical approach to his works. It contemplates the process in which the whirlwinds of German history and personal history appear as complex and tragic patterns in paintings. A house reduced to ashes by bombing and Aunt Marianne, who died in Nazi Germany's euthanasia program. Richter said the following about the photographs he used as subjects in his paintings.

"It is difficult to reconstruct what the motivation was at that time. If I were to talk about why I chose a particular photograph or why I wanted to express certain events, I only knew that there was a reason related to the content."

A Family Drama reveals the intuitive connection of subjects that, as Richter said, are unclear but vaguely related. This aligns with the way Warnert in Author Unknown painted overlapping faces of Elizabeth (Saskia Rosendahl), father-in-law Zebandt (Sebastian Koch), and Burgrafte Kroll (Rainer Bock). These respectively refer to Richter's 'Aunt Marianne,' 'Father-in-law Oeppinger,' and 'Mrs. Heide.'

Starting with 'Mrs. Heide,' Richter reflected his own story in his paintings. Werner Heide was an SS regiment commander. He was a strategist who led the euthanasia program responsible for about 100,000 deaths. Richter borrowed the classical form of 'secondary memory.' This suppresses the primary memory and is a concept discovered by Sigmund Freud (1856?1939), the founder of psychoanalysis, while studying dreams. It infers whether a figure from one's experience can represent the entire repressed subject.

Richter found sufficient potential in his father-in-law Heinrich Oeppinger. A gynecologist who was an early Nazi Party member. He regarded implementing Nazi racial policies as his mission. Following the 'law to prevent hereditary diseases in descendants,' he forcibly sterilized 1,000 female psychiatric patients. Richter's Aunt Marianne was one of the victims. A Family Drama describes Richter's complex relations as follows.

"Richter would have known at least through rumors that Oeppinger was connected with the SS. Unimaginable facts about Hitler's SS, who wore rune insignia, were revealed daily. 'Secondary memory' allowed the painter to show something without openly exposing it. Was using Heide as a subject aimed at Oeppinger? Both had sworn to Hitler's motto, 'SS men, your honor is loyalty.'"

Author Unknown presents this inference more explicitly. A representative scene is when Zebandt abruptly leaves the dinner table with Warnert after reading a newspaper. The headline on the front page reads 'Patient Murderer.' Richter is said to have conceived 'Mrs. Heide' after seeing the photo titled 'Dr. Werner Heide, Psychiatrist Like a Devil, at Prison Entrance' in the magazine Quick. The content is as follows.

"Only after ten years did the hand of justice finally catch him. Because doctors, professors, officials, and one prosecutor were caught by the hand of justice."

Richter inserted an article at the bottom of 'Mrs. Heide' reading, "Werner Heide voluntarily surrenders to the police in November 1959." The criminal painting based on news is a kind of code. It contains thoughts, imagination, and emotions. Decoding it reveals the painter's secret. It is not difficult. Humans are beings composed of the events that befall them. There are questions demanding answers and perceptions composed through art. Richter said something similar.

"Every word, every brushstroke, every thought is given to us by the era, the circumstances of the era, combinations, efforts, past, and present. Consequently, it is impossible to act and think independently with will..."

Ultimately, 'Aunt Marianne,' 'Father-in-law Oeppinger,' and 'Mrs. Heide' form a vast painting representing the collapse of the human world. They seem unrelated on the surface, but when external factors intervene, they connect and appear as a single system. The imaginary boundary drawn around them is like a wall that must be crossed to obtain the truth. Richter paid the price of sorrow to gain this. A Family Drama says this points to everything existing in the past and present.

"Family disaster, personal downfall amid the collapse of the Third Reich, messages sent to descendants, material for films about art and reality. Pruning, destruction, and broken fragments are the core issues. Each part points to the whole. In the end, certainty about the pale homeland Germany emerges."