Stefan Kürten, "Perfect World," 2016-17, installation view; oil on canvas, 110 ¼ by 145 5/8 inches
Stefan Kürten's intricate paintings of depopulated domestic interiors and enigmatic architectural spaces are "atmospheric" in Jean Baudrillard's sense of the term. In his landmark 1968 book The System of Objects, the French theorist analyzed how the furnishings, decorative objects, and color schemes in bourgeois homes-the components of atmosphere-operate as a part of overarching sign systems.
