The expansive coloured cushions developed by Gotthard Graubner - he termed them 'Colour-Space Bodies' - added a three-dimensional component to lyrical Colour Field Painting. These cushion pictures are substructures padded with Perlon fabric which is, in turn, soaked with heavily diluted colour pigments to enhance the spatial effect of the colour surface.
In 1976, Graubner was given a professorship for freestyle painting at the Düsseldorf Academy of Arts. His works were exhibited at documenta 4 (1968) and 6 (1977). A much-noticed exhibition of his works was held in 1980 at the Staatliche Kunsthalle in Baden-Baden. Numerous museum exhibitions at home and abroad followed. In 1982, Graubner designed a five-part ensemble of Colour-Space Bodies for the West German pavilion at the Venice Biennale. He was awarded the August-Macke Prize of the city of Meschede in 1987 and the North German Art Prize in 1988.
