FRAGMENTA IN LUMINE
Solo Exhibition at Kloster Eberbach
5 May – 6 September 2026

FRAGMENTA IN LUMINE

A new story, the first story.
This story. Very old, yet new again.
Yesterday is now.

The exhibition Fragmenta in lumine by Michael Anthony Müller, presented in the monks’ dormitory, situates the three stained-glass windows he designed for the basilica of Eberbach Monastery, which are installed there at the south portal, within a broader context of his artistic oeuvre. It provides insight into the background and conceptual processes that guided the artist in his work on the windows.

In terms of their motifs, the windows—which are complex in both technique and content—are based on the painting Magnesia ad Sipylum (Fragment 1) (2021/22) shown here and reinterpret the narrative of an ancient Greek myth about love, time, death, and eternity.

The myth of the Dioscuri tells the story of the twin brothers Castor and Polydeuces. The sons of Leda, a figure often depicted in art history, are conceived in a single night by two different fathers: one by Zeus, the father of the gods, who takes the form of a swan to seduce Leda; the other by her husband Tyndareus, the king of Sparta. While one is immortal as the son of a god, the other remains mortal as the son of two humans. After Castor’s death, Zeus grants the inseparable brothers the opportunity to be reunited, spending one day among the gods on Mount Olympus and the next in Hades, the realm of the dead—an eternal cycle of birth and death.

Michael Anthony Müller’s monumental painting The Given Day (2021–22/2025), originally created for a solo exhibition at the Städel Museum in Frankfurt and currently on view at the Neues Museum in Berlin, uses the language of abstract painting to depict the daily routine of the Dioscuri, whose lives are marked by heroic deeds, battles, romances, and the voyage of the Argonauts. The large-format canvases shown here, which the artist refers to as “fragments,” also allude to this myth and were created in close dialogue with the work. For the exhibition at Eberbach Monastery, the artist breaks down a complete life story into smaller pieces: into fragments, each focusing on a specific detail of the story. Fragments point to a whole they cannot fully reveal—because it has been divided, destroyed, or lost. Fragments are remnants, beginnings, traces, and echoes all at once.

The exhibition is complemented by drawings and a sculpture that deepen the theme of the fragment and of presence and absence both artistically and philosophically, and explore it from a different perspective.

Der Mönch am Meer, 2004
Graphite on paper
74 × 59 cm
Ein Habitat der Gegensätze, 2024
(from the series Weiße Flecken)
Acrylic, gesso and oil on Belgian linen
180,3 × 200,3 × 2,8 cm
San Francisco, 2017
Pencil on paper
40 × 95,5 cm
Dance course at the Cornish School for the Arts (for John Cage and Merce Cunningham), 2023–24
Acrylic and oil on Belgian linen
Two-part work, each: 196 × 160 cm
Aides-Olymp Schwebebahn GmbH
Teil 1. Bergfahrt (Olympischer Milchregen)¹
¹ Alternativer Titel: “vor Augen gestellt—das Winkelmann’sche Drehmoment oder das Begreifen hormoneller Schwankungen”, 2022
(from the series Hades)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
302,4 × 252,4 × 4 cm
Aides-Olymp Schwebebahn GmbH
Teil 2. Talfahrt (Bilder, nichts als Bilder, kein Leben)²
² Andere Farb- und Mengenverhältnisse, 2022
(from the series Hades)
Acrylic and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
302,4 × 252,4 × 4 cm
Abtragen oder hinzufügen (von vorne Heraklit von Ephesos)
Abtragen oder hinzufügen (von der Seite Heraklit von Ephesos), 2014
Pencil on pink paper
Two-part work, each: 43,5 × 31,5 cm
Platons Hölle (Fragment 1), 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
335,1 × 272,5 cm
Herakles färbt mit Blut des Geryon
Zweiter Besuch:
Der Raum als Motiv und nicht als Ort
Dritter Besuch:
Unzeitgemäße Seeungeheuer (Fragment 2), 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
Part 1: 217 × 159,8 cm; Part 2: 217 × 112,7 cm
Halber Fuß, 2014
Plaster
18 × 65 × 36 cm
Der Lesboss am Anarchist, 2024
Acrylic, gesso and oil on Belgian linen
Dark blue wooden frame and orange shadow gap
122,7 × 163,2 × 4 cm
LPHY (am Kreuz), 2022–2023
Acrylic, lacquer and synthetic resin lacquer on printed foil mounted on a wooden stretcher
Acrylic glass cover
118,3 × 81,1 × 7,5 cm
Der Kopf des zwölfjährigen Jesus, A. D. in anderer Zeichentechnik, 2013
Pencil on pink paper
43,5 × 31,5 cm
Ein Werk, drei Bilder
Part 2: Twin world (Ein Werk, drei Bilder (Der Olymp als Spiegel oder gibt es ein Ende der Welt?)), 2022–2024
Acrylic, lacquer and oil on printed Belgian linen
Part 2 left: 260 × 356 cm; Part 2 right: 260 × 235 cm
Ein Werk, drei Bilder
Part 1: Ein Werk, drei Bilder (Kastor und Polydeukes am Rande des Spiegeluniversums), 2022–2024
Acrylic, lacquer and oil on printed Belgian linen
Part 1 left: 260 × 235 cm; Part 1 right: 260 × 356 cm
Platons Hölle (Fragment 2), 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
Part 1: 244,9 × 160 cm; Part 2: 244,5 × 180,3 cm
Magnesia am Sipylos Μαγνησία ἡ ὑπὸ Σιπύλῳ (Fragment 1), 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
335,1 × 272,5 cm
Die Sehnsucht des unbestechlichen Fährmanns, 2025
Acrylic and lacquer on Belgian linen
Part 1: 208,1 × 160 × 3 cm; Part 2: 208,1 × 160 × 3 cm
Der erschöpfte Sigmar Polke (nach einer Begegnung mit Merz und Beuys), 2025
Acrylic and lacquer on Belgian linen
180 × 145 × 4,5 cm
Der Hades ist in der Welt, 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
333 × 272,5 × 4 cm
Arbeit macht frei (nach Stella), 2025
Acrylic and lacquer on Belgian linen
201,4 × 245,2 × 2,7 cm
Sturz in einen anderen Raum, zur gleichen Zeit (Fragment 1), 2021/2022
(from the series Zeitfragmente)
Acrylic, gesso and lacquer on printed Belgian linen
Part 1: 247 × 50 cm; Part 2: 297,9 × 132 cm
Einsam (Giordano Bruno), 2010
Pencil, gouache on paper, colored acrylic glass
41,5 × 31,5 cm
Einsam (Sadhu), 2010
Pencil, gouache on paper, colored acrylic glass
41,5 × 31,5 cm
Einsam (Grigori Jefimowitsch Rasputin), 2010
Pencil, gouache on paper, colored acrylic glass
31 × 41,5 cm