FOX/JENSEN/McCRORY and FOX/JENSEN are pleased to announce that Hanns Kunitzberger will be represented by the galleries in Auckland and Sydney.

The paintings of Hanns Kunitzberger take an approach to colour that feels rooted in nature and the forces of meteorology. However his colour is not captive to describing these phenomena, rather it marries with a sophisticated and tender gesture to evoke atmospheres that are as much cerebral as visceral, as much metaphysical as physical.

In his Berlin studio in late October, the weather outside had already turned and the heaviness and portent that accompanies the onset of winter in northern Europe was waiting. Inside the studio however there was an entirely different atmosphere, the paintings seemed to be spirited by the most subtle vibrations of colour and touch. The considerations that Kunitzberger makes about the support, the nature of the linen, all seemed to be impacting the behaviour of the paint so that some seemed to reach forward to meet our gaze and others displayed a reticence and reserve – a soto voce quality that quietened the entire room.

One cannot look at such beautifully calibrated paintings where colour looms and swells and not bring Mark Rothko to mind but Kunitzberger’s romanticism is cooled by a less theatrical tendency that is perhaps closer to Ad Reinhardt. There is such delicacy in the way that pigment is finessed, where its quiet accumulation rises like the gentlest note that is almost imperceptible at first but builds decibel by decibel until your senses are taken over by it.

The experience of Kunitzberger’s paintings on that brisk Berlin day will stay with me for a long time. For those who are witless enough to have declared painting dead or late modernism as the last gasp of a Utopian illusion, I found Hann’s paintings both invigorating and relevant.

The galleries are thrilled to be representing Hanns Kunitzberger and we are delighted to say that the first paintings will arrive just this side of Christmas and the first presentations of his work will be at Art Basel Hong Kong 2019 and in the curated project 'Permafrost' in May 2019 in Sydney. Solo exhibitions of Kunitzberger’s work will follow in both galleries

Recent major exhibitions of Hanns Kunitzberger’s paintings include:

• Museum Wiesbaden.
• Staatliche Museen zu Berlin Gemäldegalerie
• Kunsthalle Emden.
• Austrian Cultural Forum Berlin.
• KunstHaus Potsdam.
• MMK-Zollamt, Dom St. Bartholomäus and Haus a.Dom in Frankfurt am Main.
• Künstlerhaus Vienna.