Better than de Kooning

»STONED AGIN« »Better than de Kooning«, this title quoted for a group exhibition sounds like a terrible genre joke, because »nobody can paint better than de Kooning«, so it is an ideal title for a group show exhibition. Peter Saul paints during the mid-1970s a series of pictures of women that parodies the »Woman«-pictures (1950-53) of Willem de Kooning. He meticulously imitates the brush strokes and the impasto in a stylistic mix of Pointillism and Graffiti Art, turns up the colour regulator, and allows the abstract-expressionist painting and the women themselves to blend in a »Daliesque« manner, like soft ice cream (see the text »Un Autre Monde« by Marcus Weber and »Ice Creams, Atom Bomb, I-Screens, Data Bomb« by Esther Leslie in this book). In 2008, Saul paints another version of this cartoon-like, neon avatar and calls his painting »Better than de Kooning« ...a relief of US reality. Artists: Tim Berresheim, Jana Euler, Maria Lassnig, Lee Lozano, Michel Majerus, Dieter Krieg, Katrin Plavcak, Jon Rafman, Gunter Reski, Peter Saul, Matthias Schaufler, Jim Shaw, Amy Sillman, Sue Williams Exhibition: Villa Merkel Galerien der Stadt Esslingen: 12/9-15/11/2015