Mau led a secluded life in Hamburg. He mainly painted from photographs of his travels through the United States 
or, as here, a train carriage on the London Underground. The fact that he superimposed different images with 
the help of a slide projector is evident from the flatness of the passenger, who appears to be pasted onto the 
painting. For Mau, this turned ‘the obvious into something special’. His work was much appreciated by the New York Photorealists in the early 1970s. [text 2024]