Parsifal III

Anselm Kiefer’s Parsifal III and the Weight of German Mythology

In 1973, Anselm Kiefer created Parsifal III as part of a series that grappled with Richard Wagner’s opera Parsifal—a work steeped in Arthurian legend and Christian redemption. This painting emerged during a period when Kiefer was confronting Germany’s fractured post-war identity, using thick impasto and a darkened palette to evoke both destruction and the possibility of renewal. The title references the third act of Wagner’s opera, where the wounded Amfortas seeks healing through the Holy Grail—a metaphor Kiefer repurposed to interrogate cultural memory and collective guilt.

The canvas itself becomes a battleground: layers of oil, acrylic, and shellac build into a textured surface that resists easy interpretation. Kiefer’s use of shellac, a brittle resin, introduces cracks that mirror the fractures in post-war German consciousness. As the Tate notes, his works from this era often employed materials that decay or transform over time, reinforcing themes of impermanence. Here, the dense, almost sculptural application of paint forces the viewer to confront the physicality of history—not as a distant narrative, but as an immediate, tactile presence.

Kiefer in the 1970s: Confronting the Unspeakable

The early 1970s marked Kiefer’s transition from photography to large-scale painting, a shift that coincided with his deepening engagement with German history. Unlike his contemporaries in the Neo-Expressionist movement—such as Georg Baselitz or Jörg Immendorff—Kiefer’s work avoided overt political sloganeering in favor of a more ambiguous, symbolic language. His Parsifal series, to which this work belongs, reflected a preoccupation with Wagner not as a musical figure but as a cultural symbol tainted by Nazi appropriation. The opera’s themes of purity and redemption became, in Kiefer’s hands, a vehicle for exploring the limits of atonement.

Critics often note that Kiefer’s canvases from this period function as palimpsests: surfaces scraped, burned, and rebuilt to mirror the layered complexities of memory. Parsifal III exemplifies this approach through its stratified composition, where earlier marks remain visible beneath the dominant forms. The painting’s muted tonal range—dominated by blacks, grays, and occluded reds—further distances it from the vibrant chromatics of American Abstract Expressionism, aligning it instead with the austere materiality of Arte Povera. Yet where Arte Povera embraced ephemeral materials, Kiefer’s works insist on permanence, their heavy frames and thick paint asserting a defiant physicality.

Kiefer’s Parsifal III does not depict a scene so much as it enacts a process: the viewer does not observe the painting but moves through its strata, much like parsing a half-remembered myth.

The Alchemy of Parsifal III: Material as Meaning

Composition: A Landscape of Ruins

The painting’s structure defies traditional perspective, instead presenting a field of competing textures and forms. Kiefer abandons the horizon line, replacing it with a vertical axis that draws the eye upward through a series of jagged, almost architectural fragments. These forms suggest both the ruins of a cathedral and the skeletal remains of a forest, collapsing sacred and natural imagery into a single, ambiguous space. The absence of a vanishing point mirrors the disorientation of post-war Germany, where familiar landmarks—physical and ideological—had been obliterated.

Surface and Symbolism

The tactile quality of Parsifal III results from Kiefer’s unorthodox technique of mixing oil paint with shellac and straw, creating a surface that is simultaneously painterly and sculptural. Shellac, typically used as a varnish, here becomes a primary medium: its brittle nature causes the surface to crack as it dries, introducing fissures that evoke the passage of time. These cracks are not defects but deliberate interventions, forcing light to catch unevenly across the canvas. The limited palette—dominated by umbers, ochres, and blacks—further emphasizes the materiality of the work, as if the painting itself were an artifact excavated from the rubble of history.

Displaying Parsifal III: A Statement of Contrast

Kiefer’s work demands a setting that can accommodate its gravitational presence. The 30×40 cm (12×16") dimensions make it ideal for a study, library, or minimalist living space where its textured surface can be appreciated up close. Pair it with neutral walls—soft grays or warm whites—to allow the painting’s dark palette to dominate without competition. Avoid overly bright rooms; instead, opt for spaces with controlled lighting, such as a north-facing wall or a spot illuminated by a directed lamp, which will accentuate the cracks in the shellac.

For a bold contrast, place Parsifal III opposite a piece of modernist furniture—think a Le Corbusier chaise or a Florence Knoll sofa—to juxtapose Kiefer’s historical weight with the clean lines of mid-century design. The frame’s depth (included with your print) ensures the work projects slightly from the wall, casting subtle shadows that enhance its three-dimensional quality. In a home office, it serves as a focal point that grounds the space in intellectual rigor, while in a bedroom, its meditative darkness encourages reflection.

More Works by Anselm Kiefer

Explore Kiefer’s evolving dialogue with history and materiality through these key pieces from different decades.

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