Strandkasernen, 1983 – 1987

About the Work

The universal artist and non-conformist Dieter Roth defies categorisation. In ‘Beach Barracks’, a wide variety of ‘refuse’ and art supplies have been interwoven to form a powerful Informel-style assemblage. Gestural traces of paint connect the individual parts in a painterly-sculptural all-over and emphasise the accumulation, which only seems to be chaotic. The result is a poetic image whose enigmatic title raises questions. It conveys as much a sense of failure and death as it does traces of joyful beauty – and even a strain of self-mockery.