The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 20, 2025

Head of Gerda Boehm

1981

Frank Auerbach

(British, 1931–2024)
England, 20th century
oil on canvas
Unframed: 64.1 x 61 cm (25 1/4 x 24 in.)
Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund 1982.38
Location: Not on view

Description

In his portraits, Auerbach is more interested in capturing personality, emotion, and form than representing the person’s likeness. This is a portrait of his cousin Gerda, presented as a series of shared experiences between the artist and sitter. By scraping and building up the canvas surface with thick paint he creates abstracted figures. As he said about painting portraits, “Nothing can be left out…you have to bury the irrelevant in the painting somehow,” evident in the painting’s overwhelming sculptural thickness. Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund 1982.38
  • Henning, Edward B. “New Paintings by Four Artists from Britain.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 69, no. 10 (December 1982): 311–323. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 316-317, fig. 8 www.jstor.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art. Masterworks on Loan: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Cleveland Museum of Art: October 2016 through February 2017. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2016.
    Auerbach, Frank, and William Feaver. Frank Auerbach.
    New York : Rizzoli, 2022. Reproduced: p. 331, no. 458
  • "Contemporary Collection," CMA (Aug. 17 - Nov. 6, 1983).
    The Year in Review for 1982. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 5-February 6, 1983).
    "Contemporary Art," CMA (Nov. 3 - Dec. 12, 1982).
    "Frank Auerbach," Marlborough Gallery, New York City (April 2 - 30, 1982).
  • {{cite web|title=Head of Gerda Boehm|url=false|author=Frank Auerbach|year=1981|access-date=20 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1982.38