Sigmar Polke, “Silver Paintings”

Germany’s consummate pop prankster is best known for joining forces with Gerhard Richter to create Capitalist Realism, but as his 2014 MoMA survey amply demonstrated, that was but a tip of the iceberg. His work wandered all over the place, often into strange experiments involving toxic materials. The abstract works here were created using various solutions of silver (silver bromide, silver sulfate and silver nitrate) painted on linen and sealed with varnish. The effects are weird, compelling, ghostly—in short, pure Polke.