About Albert Oehlen

Albert Oehlen (born 1954 in Krefeld, Germany) is one of the most influential contemporary German artists, acclaimed for his radical and experimental approach to painting. Over the course of his career, Oehlen has consistently challenged the conventions of traditional painting, navigating the boundaries between abstraction and figuration while merging disparate artistic styles into dynamic new forms. His work exemplifies a restless pursuit of innovation, where painting itself becomes both subject and experiment.

In his early career, Oehlen rejected polished notions of beauty and aesthetics, embracing instead a raw and deliberately unrefined visual language. His canvases often feature bold brushstrokes, smears, erasures, and gestural marks, emphasizing spontaneity and the imperfections inherent in the creative act. This energy highlights not only the process of painting but also its capacity to resist categorization.

A defining hallmark of Oehlen’s practice is his playful incorporation of varied techniques and media. His paintings often blend abstraction, figuration, collage, and even computer-generated imagery, creating visually arresting compositions that blur the boundaries between artistic traditions. This hybrid approach allows him to question hierarchies within the art world while expanding the possibilities of contemporary painting.

Technology plays a central role in Oehlen’s exploration of visual language. By integrating digital tools and computer imagery into his canvases and fine art prints, he creates works that exist at the intersection of analog and digital culture. His editions and limited edition prints extend this dialogue, recontextualizing digital aesthetics within the painterly tradition and making his experimental vision accessible to collectors worldwide.

Through his constant reinvention and defiance of categorization, Albert Oehlen has secured his place as a pivotal figure in postwar and contemporary art. His work continues to challenge, provoke, and inspire, offering a vital reflection on the evolving state of painting in the digital age.

Notable exhibitions

Albert Oehlen’s exhibition history underscores his reputation as one of the most daring and innovative painters of his generation. Since the 1980s, his work has been presented in major international solo exhibitions, charting his progression from provocative beginnings in Germany to recognition on the global stage.

His early institutional breakthroughs included shows at the Kunsthalle Basel (1987) and Kunsthalle Zürich (1989), which established him as a central figure in contemporary German art. Over the following decades, Oehlen’s influence was affirmed by retrospectives and large-scale exhibitions at leading museums worldwide, including the Serpentine Gallery in London, the Palazzo Grassi in Venice, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, the New Museum in New York, mumok in Vienna, and the Whitechapel Gallery in London.

Other highlights include Albert Oehlen: Grau at the Kunstmuseum Bonn (2012) and Albert Oehlen: Home and Garden at the New Museum, New York (2015), both of which showcased his groundbreaking explorations of abstraction, figuration, and digital imagery. More recently, Albert Oehlen: Cows by the Water at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (2018) and its subsequent European tour demonstrated the breadth of his experimentation across painting, collage, and limited edition prints.

Oehlen’s participation in international biennials, including the Venice Biennale, and the inclusion of his artworks in leading public collections such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and the Tate Modern in London, affirm his global standing. Together, these exhibitions highlight his continuous reinvention of painting and secure his position as one of the most influential contemporary artists of the postwar era.