Peter Keil
Peter Robert Keil was born in August 1942 in Züllichau, Pomerania (now Poland). After his father was killed on the Eastern Front during WWII, Keil and his mother fled through postwar Germany to West Berlin. Growing up among gray housing blocks, he found refuge in nearby parks, settings that later appeared frequently in his paintings.
Keil’s artistic awakening began in the local library, where he discovered Expressionism and especially Picasso. Inspired by vivid color and emotional force, he began painting, initially studying and copying Picasso’s work, whom he later met in Spain. At age fifteen, Keil met painter Otto Nagel, who became his first mentor. Nagel taught him technique, realism, and outdoor painting while guiding him through Berlin’s back streets, helping Keil develop an artist’s eye and foundational craft.
Keil later studied at the Berlin Academy of Fine Arts, where he formed important connections with artists including Baselitz, Fetting, Lüpertz, and Salomé. Immersed in Berlin’s avant-garde scene, he earned the nickname “Wildman of Berlin” for his passionate personality and expressive work. The construction of the Berlin Wall severed his relationship with Nagel but deepened the political and emotional content of his art.
In the early 1960s, Keil befriended Joan Miró in Mallorca, whose emphasis on spontaneity and pure color helped steer him toward a raw neo-expressionist style. Keil later lived and worked in Paris and London, painting street life and portraits while refining his dynamic brushwork. His work from this period is now considered an important visual record of early West German neo-expressionism.
