Hamburg, Germany, 1971.
He studied at Muthesius Hochschule fur Kunst und Gestaltung, Kiel (1992-1993) and Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften FB Gestaltung professor Dieter Glasmacher in Hamburg (1993-1998).
Gerhard’s paintings suggest a microcosm of his own in which the borders between reality and fiction blur and where fantasy invades the real world. His images are innocuous, based on photographs featuring young people at festivals and sunrises. We can’t tell if they represent peaceful concentrations or disturbances.
He uses photographs from the Internet taken at informal gatherings that take place during the summer at Externsteinen in the Teutoburger Forest in north-eastern Germany. The ideological backdrop for these gatherings is the celebration of the new German paganism, mixed with elements of New Age philosophy.
Gerhard’s paintings tell the story of groups of people who meet spontaneously, forming an ephemeral society to experience the sensations of a particular moment in time. The visual space created by the artist goes beyond the rational and harmonious world, conveying a mysterious and disconcerting state of mind. His figures turn their backs on the spectators, creating a frontier between the outer and inner worlds.
His work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco in the United States.
Lives and works in Hamburg.
Works in the collection:
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