In the artistic heritage of Surrealism, Neo Rauch refers explicitly to the subconscious as a source for his pictorial inventions and allows room for coincidence as a compositional element. The collage-like technique, the deformations and disassociations of the figures and objects, their erratic purpose in the painting and their indistinct meaning are all typical elements of the surrealist aesthetic. An aesthetic of surprises that assembles what does not belong together, visualises the unexpected and freely associates dream images in order to open a door upon the subconscious.

The puzzle thus arising and the suspected meaning resulting from this for the viewer, however, remain unresolved over time in the face of an enigmatic iconography that cannot be interpreted.

It is precisely this, which make the artists’ paintings so appealing: the works appear to depict a great deal and to unfold an unprecedented story, yet actually always remain inapprehensible in the real world. It is this view into the subconscious that only reveals itself in the pictorially manifested dream world of Neo Rauch. The painter himself commented on this intention as follows:

“I am obviously a narrator; I need the representational to approach the poetry of my dreams more closely. (…) I can now finally spell with these things. (…) I try to direct. I try to curb the things and deliberately stage the aspects of the subconscious. (…) That is what’s beautiful about the principle of painting, that the upheavals in the soul, the undersea currents manifest themselves very directly, whether I want them to or not.”