Literature: Thomas Weber, K. F. Dahmen, catalog raisonné, vol. 1, 1946-1965, Cologne, 2003, 146, no. 025.55

Although Karl Fred Dahmen sought relics of the natural or urban landscape in his works, he did not want to depict visible reality. Instead of an illusionistic view, he strove for the reality of matter: thus his paintings became more impasto, more relief-like, in order to make depth haptically tangible. Even the painting ground, in this case of a "cityscape" that appears as if collaged, conveys a solidity that would not be achievable on canvas - the ultimately abstract motif is painted on a hardboard. The cityscape is reduced associatively to a piece of wall, the surface of which itself resembles a landscape in puckered relief.