The formally reduced paintings from the late 1950s and early 1960s make up a special group of works in Rupprecht Geiger's early oeuvre. In addition to circular forms, he put focus on the rectangle as a field of even distribution in works from this phase is, which is enhanced by gentle color modulations to form a meditative color space. In contrast to the later creations, which were mostly in neon tones, the palette around 1960 was still dominated by warm red and differentiated blue tones, which often appeared in combination, but also in isolation from one another.
In the painting offered here from 1957, Geiger intensifies the color blue, which is so important in his oeuvre, through the use of black and brown tones. He places them in a powerful tension, with which the gently oscillating blue appears all the more radiant due to the clearly defined rectangular shape. The color field within the rectangle, which is vaguely reminiscent of an oval, increases the visual cohesion. The desired reduction in form, which Geiger continued to push, especially in the course of the 1960s, led him to a composition of particular clarity in "Schwarze Form vor Blau" (1957). The intention to increase the expressive potential of the color and ultimately to let it become effective as an autonomous force, can be felt intensively in this painting. [AM]