Norbert Bisky Sleep of Reason, 2025

Norbert Bisky's Sleep of Reason features the characteristic formal vocabulary of young men set in brightly colored abstracted environments. In this case, a shift in perspective moves from a close-up view of a sleeping figure holding a mobile phone in their left hand, to small figures suspended or falling in a bright blue-green sky flecked with silhouetted birds or bats. Integrating motifs from torn film posters, the work also recalls the French post-World War II artists known as "affichistes" who celebrated that aesthetic. The title quotes the famous etching by Francisco Goya from his 1799 series Los Caprichos: "The sleep of reason produces monsters (El sueño de la razon produce monstruos)." To Bisky, Goya represents an important art historical reference point as an artist who produced both court portraits and a body of controversial and political explosive works.