Flow – P5

‘Flow (P5)’ (2014) is an entrancing printed facsimile after one of Gerhard Richter’s ‘Flow’ series (2013)
paintings. Produced through his intriguing process of allowing poured enamel paints to move and
naturally interact, the painting is defined by a vivid sea of yellow enamel thinly streaked with browns,
greens and purples, which are complimented by the above fields of deep blue.

These merging or starkly contrasting colours are covered with clear glass which interrupts the fluid
movement of the paints and flattens their painterly qualities into a seemingly objective configuration.
The work makes representational suggestions, such as fields of beach or desert‐like yellow and blue
strokes recollective of the sea or sky, but nonetheless remains abstract and impenetrable.

By using glass Richter denies the gestural process required to produce these works. Instead, shifting,
spontaneous images become seemingly remote and inaccessible, an effect maintained in its facsimile.
Printed as a Diasec‐mounted chromogenic print on aluminium, ‘Flow (P5)’ maintains the original’s
integrity and allusion of intangibility. It is not only a superb facsimile but also an artwork in its own right.
Reversing the logic of Richter’s acclaimed photo paintings, ‘Flow (P5)’ continues the artist’s perennial
search for new languages of abstraction.