Claus Bertermann - FORMENTERA 01 (XXL-format)

Artist: Claus Bertermann

OFFICIAL WEBSITE: www.bertermann.art

Claus Bertermann is an internationally established contemporary artist whose market profile is backed by international market authority and exceptional secondary market results. Known for his powerful, large-format abstract works, Bertermann has consistently commanded high-tier prices at the world’s most prestigious auction houses. His top realized prices include €18,900 at C. h. r. i. s. t. i. e´s Paris (Retro Zen), €15,240 at S. o. t. h. e. b. y´s Cologne (F5TP#CB), and €15,120 at C. h. r. i. s. t. i. e´s Paris (Whispershade). With additional successful sales at V. a. n. H. a. m, A. r. t. c. u. r. i. a. l, T. a. j. a. n, and D. o. r. o. t. h. e. u. m, Bertermann’s work is a proven asset for serious collectors worldwide.

A New Series of Travelled Places

With a Master’s degree in Architecture (TU Munich), Bertermann originally gained global recognition for his "architectural strata" technique—layering and scraping oil paint to build spatial depth. "Formentera 01" belongs to a deliberate new departure. Setting aside the roller-and-oil-pastel method of his earlier figurative work, Bertermann here paints everything wet-in-wet with large brushes, intentionally letting the colours bleed and merge for a far more fluid, organic result. His reference points are the painters of German Expressionism—distorted perspectives, heightened, emotionally charged colour. This canvas is part of a wholly new body of work drawn from the places the artist returns to on his travels.

International Artistic Footprint

With more than 1,000 large format works in private and institutional collections across the globe—including a monumental triptych at his alma mater, the Technical University of Munich—Bertermann continues to bridge the gap between rigorous structure and intuitive freedom. This Catawiki offering presents a rare opportunity to acquire an early work of an exciting new series from an artist with a solidified international auction record.

Key details for collectors

– Title: Formentera 01
– Year: 2026
– Dimensions (H x W): 210 x 160 cm (83 × 63 inches)
– Medium: Acrylic on canvas
– Signed by the artist on the front and back side
– Original, one-of-a-kind artwork - MADE BY A REAL PERSON, NOT AI.
– Ships rolled without frame

What makes this piece unique

"Formentera 01" holds a single, unremarkable moment and treats it as worth two metres of canvas: a lone swimmer crossing a small turquoise bay near Es Caló, on the eastern edge of the island. Nothing dramatic happens. A body moves through clear water on an ordinary summer afternoon, head and shoulders above the surface, the rest already dissolving into the sea.

That ordinariness is the whole point. The painting refuses to stage a drama or tell us who the swimmer is or where the day is going. It fixes a condition instead—the weightless, completely undramatic pleasure of being in the sea—and asks the harder question: whether an entirely unremarkable instant can carry the same weight as any grand subject. It is the wager the new series is built on: that the experienced moment does not have to be special to become a special moment, and that painting is what does the elevating.

In this series, Claus Bertermann fundamentally changes his physical process. He abandons the roller ground and the oil-pastel contour drawing of his earlier figurative work. Instead, the entire surface is built wet-in-wet with large brushes: water, rock, foliage and figure are laid down while the paint is still live, so that one colour runs into the next and the boundaries dissolve. The swimmer's body does not sit on top of the sea; it is made of the same wet paint and keeps merging back into it.

The result is openly indebted to German Expressionism. Perspective is intentionally loosened, the bay tips up toward the viewer, and the colour is pushed well past description into pure sensation: turquoise and acid green colliding with cobalt and deep navy, white foam flicked across the surface, ochre rock and dark coastal scrub holding the edges. This is no longer construction by layering and scraping; it is a single sustained gesture, painted forward, at speed, on a wet field.

Why it is worth the price

This is a large-scale, museum-sized painting (210 x 160 cm) from a new direction in Bertermann’s practice—the moment an internationally collected artist visibly turns a corner. For collectors, an early work of a defined new series is a meaningful provenance marker: this is the kind of canvas that fixes the vocabulary everything after it will be measured against.

The wet-in-wet handling gives the surface a rare immediacy—you can read the speed of the arm, the decision made in a single pass, the moment two colours met and were allowed to stay merged. Bertermann couples this freedom with his trained architect’s instinct for structure, so the dissolving figure and water never lose their spatial logic: the bay still recedes, the rocks still hold the frame, the swimmer still crosses the centre.

"Formentera 01" balances expressive, high-key force with a quietly human subject—an ordinary swim, remembered and elevated—making it both immediately compelling on the wall and conceptually lasting for collectors.

Visual description & condition

The composition looks down onto a small coastal bay. A lone swimmer with dark hair moves through the centre of the canvas, the face caught in a few decisive strokes, the shoulders and torso merging into bands of teal, mint, cobalt and deep navy flecked with white foam. The water fills most of the surface, painted in fast, overlapping strokes of turquoise and green against darker blue.

Rocks in ochre, tan and warm brown frame the bay along the lower edge and the upper right, threaded with dark-green coastal vegetation and scattered touches of acid yellow and violet. The entire surface is painted wet-in-wet with large brushes; colours visibly run and merge into one another. Perspective and anatomy are intentionally distorted to prioritise emotional weight over realism. The work is signed "Bertermann" in dark paint at the lower right.

The work is unframed and not stretched. Condition is excellent. All surface irregularities are intentional and integral to the artist's process.

Background / artistic context

Claus Bertermann works within contemporary expressive figurative painting, focusing on states of being rather than mere representation. With "Formentera 01" he continues a new chapter that places the human figure inside a charged landscape, drawing directly on the legacy of German Expressionism: bent perspective, heightened colour, and a surface kept deliberately fluid.

By switching to an all-over wet-in-wet method—large brushes, merged colours, a single forward pass—Bertermann trades the cool separation of ground and drawing in his earlier figurative work for something warmer and more volatile. "Formentera 01" embodies this method precisely: an ordinary moment in the water, dissolved into pure colour and movement, and part of a travel series in which the smallest, most everyday scenes are treated as worth painting at museum scale.

Practical details for buyers:

Original, one-of-a-kind artwork
Acrylic on canvas
Dimensions (H x W): 210 x 160 cm (83 × 63 inches)
Signed by the artist on the front and back side
Certificate of authenticity included
Shipped rolled (not framed or stretched)
Professional packaging and worldwide shipping with premium shipping companies like UPS.

The canvas includes an additional continuous white border of approximately 10 cm (approx. 4 inches) on all sides beyond the painted surface. This margin allows the artwork to be professionally restretched on museum-quality stretcher bars up to 6 cm (approx. 2.4 inches) in depth, resulting in a clean, frameless, gallery-style presentation without the need for a decorative frame.

Please note that the artwork is sold unframed and without stretcher bars. Professional stretching is the responsibility of the buyer. The painting is shipped rolled for safe international transport and flexible installation according to the buyer's preference.

The artwork is signed on both front and reverse, with title, year, and the artist's full name inscribed on the back.