Neo Rauch "At the Well" at DAVID ZWIRNER

James Kalm has been following the work of Neo Rauch since a happenstance visit to his one person show at the Haus der Kunst in Munich in 2001. Since then, your correspondent has reviewed and video recorded Rauch whenever possible. As a former citizen of the Deutsche Demokratische Republik and a leading figure of the Leipzig School of painters, the artists has acquired a unique position as social prognosticator of Post-Socialist Europe. Melding influences as disparate as Communist propaganda, comic books, obscure German art history and Surrealism, Rauch builds out ambitious pictures that never quite coalesce into coherent narratives, but require the viewer's imagination to supply their plot-lines. This has positioned Rauch as one of today's most enigmatic, prolific and recognized German artists.