Four years before he made the present work, Gotthard Graubner created the two huge "Color Space Bodies" called "Begegnungen" (Encounters) for Bellevue Palace, residence of the German President in Berlin. Today the two violet and yellow works still adorn the two end walls of the Great Hall and fill the room with their tremendous color tone. While Graubner covered his early cushion paintings with fine nylon fabrics, he increasingly used solid canvas fabrics backed with wadding for his later, larger-format "Color Space Bodies" like in our vibrant work. The paint, which evokes a cloudy depth, is usually applied onto the substrate on the floor using a wide variety of broom-like brushes. In order to increase the complexity and depth of the individual color values - such as the nuanced, condensed green in our outstanding work - into a body of color and space characterized by an oscillating effect and a unique aesthetic presence, numerous drying processes and a special compositional sensitivity are required - a crucial feature of Graubner's painterly oeuvre. Starting with watercolors and then on canvas, Graubner experimented with forms of paint application that gave the multiple layers of paint priority over the limiting form of the picture's edges. In order to enhance the spatial effect, Graubner began to cover paint cushions with Perlon fabric in the early 1960s. By soaking and painting the fabric cushions with several layers of diluted acrylic paint beforehand, Graubner achieved a fluctuating, breathing densification similar to a color space that reaches out to the viewer. Eventually, Graubner replaced the older work designations "Farbleib" (Color Body) and "Kissenbild" (Cushion Picture) with the term "Farbraumkörper" (Color Space Body) in 1970. These impressive creations were first exhibited by the important Düsseldorf gallerist Alfred Schmela, who was also one of the first to present the young "ZERO" artists in the 1960s, as well as Gerhard Richter's first solo exhibition in 1964. Graubner was a progressive eccentric and at the same time a child of his time, considering that Frank Stella also tried to break the boundaries of the classic panel painting with his "Shaped Canvases" in the 1960s, and thus - just like Graubner - wanted to achieve the greatest possible congruence between form and content. In 1968, Graubner showed his early "Cushion Pictures" at the documenta in Kassel. In 1969, Graubner was appointed professor at the University of Fine Arts in Hamburg. From the 1980s onward, Graubner finally achieved a maximum dissolution of the color effect's boundaries in his large "Farbraumkörper" (Color Space Bodies), of which the present work is a striking example. The structure of the coarse canvas supports the color's pure effect, entirely liberated from the boundaries of form. It does not appear flat, but sculptural, can unfold and achieve a hidden, slightly implied sculptural effect. Due to the innovative aesthetics of this three-dimensional painting, Graubner's "Farbraumkörper" are considered the central work complex in his oeuvre. [JS]