This exhibition is the first European retrospective to offer a comprehensive insight into the work of New York artist Ruth Marten, who has become known for her surprising, witty and subversive revisions of old prints. The Max Ernst Museum of the LVR shows works from nearly five decades.

Ruth Marten worked in the 1970s as a tattoo artist and worked in the following years as an illustrator for various publishers and American magazines. After an extensive series that reveals her fascination for hair as a motif and texture, in 2006 she began to paint over postcards, engravings and illustrations from past centuries or to use them for collages.