Like many of Gerhard Richter’s paintings, this one began with a photograph: the artist projected a portrait he had taken of a friend onto canvas, then replicated it in oil. The work simulates the realism of the original photograph while blurring the subject, as is characteristic of many of his early works. Portrait Wachenfeld (104–3) is one of the acclaimed Grey Paintings Richter made in the 1960s during a period of interest in the color’s neutrality. The work was executed in Düsseldorf, the artist’s adopted home after he had fled to West Berlin from East Germany in 1961, just prior to the erection of the Berlin Wall.

Wall label, 2021.