Wer jetzt kein Haus mehr hat, baut sich keines mehr (Who Has No House Now, Will Never Build One)
2018–2019
Emulsion, oil, acrylic and shellac on canvas

This piece takes its name from a passage by the German poet, Rainer Maria Rilke. In the 1960s, a teenage Kiefer had his first encounter with Rilke’s words when he discovered his monograph on the French sculptor Auguste Rodin. The phrase “Who Has No House Now, Will Never Build One” comes from the poem Autumn Day (1902), in which Rilke uses the motif of autumn to explore the melancholy of life’s transience and the seasons’ broad symbolism. In the centre of the painting, the faint structure of a door frame alludes to the house that may never be built before winter arrives. Rilke’s lament on the passage of time and the changing seasons drawing us closer to the year’s end is particularly resonate for Kiefer, whose art frequently considers the natural cycle of death and new life, endings and beginnings. In this painting, Kiefer’s autumnal palette erupts from the surface of the canvas in heady strokes that are at once sumptuous and beautiful while on the verge of decay, paving the way for winter and the renewal of spring.

This translation is by Edward Snow 1991:

Autumn Day (Herbsttag)

Lord: it is time. The summer was immense.
Lay your long shadows on the sundials,
and on the meadows let the winds go free.

Command the last fruits to be full;
give them just two more southern days,
urge them on to completion and chase
the last sweetness into the heavy wine.

Who has no house now, will never build one.
Who is alone now, will long remain so,
will stay awake, read, write long letters
and will wander restlessly up and down
the tree-lines streets, when the leaves are drifting.