1991 Installation "Kindskopf" (Child's Head) in the Minoriten Church in Krems, Niederösterreichisches Landesmuseum (Museum of Lower Austria).
Helnwein paints a 6x4 m (18x12 feet) child's head for the apse of the early Gothic basilica. Ten days before the opening he has his children Amadeus, Ali Elvis and Mercedes paint large-format canvases which he then arranges in the basilica ...

Works on the "48 Portraits".
a series of 48 monochrome red paintings of women (oil on canvas) as a counterpart to Gerhard Richter's "48 Portraits" of 1971, which depict only men in monochrome grey.
The cycle of paintings is first shown in the Galerie Koppelmann in Cologne, and later aquired by collector Peter Ludwig for the Ludwig Museum in Aachen.

Helnwein works on a series of dark, monochrome paintings.
He applies more and more layers of oil varnish to his realistic blue monochrome pictures till the subjects are almost indiscernible.

1990 One-man show in the Musée de l'Elysée, Lausanne. Installation "Neunter November Nacht".

Set and costumes for "Die Verfolgung und Ermordung Jean Paul Marats, dargestellt durch die Schauspielgruppe des Hospizes zu Charenton unter Anleitung des Herrn de Sade".
(The Persecution and Murder of Jean Paul Marat, Performed by the Drama Group of the Hospice at Charenton under the Direction of Monsieur de Sade) by Peter Weiss, directed by Hans Kresnik at the Staatstheater in Stuttgart.

Collaboration with Marlene Dietrich on the book "Some Facts about Myself", for the occasion of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Her essay that gave the book it's title was the last text that Marlene Dietrich wrote in her life.
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1989 One-man show at Folkwang Museum in Essen.
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Helnwein meets William S. Burroughs in Lawrence, Kansas.
Burroughs says about Helnwein: "It is the function of the artist to evoke the experience of surprised recognition: to show the viewer what he knows but does not know that he knows.
Helnwein is a master of surprised recognition" ...

Torino Fotografia 1989, Biennale Internationale.
Gottfried Helnwein, David Hockney, Clegg and Guttmann ...

Stage design and costumes for "Oedipus" by Sophocles at Hans Kresnik's Choreographic Theatre in Heidelberg.

Work on the set and costumes for "Carmina Burana" by Carl Orff at the Bayerische Staatsoper opera house (opening of the 1990 Munich Festival).
When Wolfgang Sawallisch, the head of the Staatsoper, sees the radical costume design, he is so shocked that he immediately calls a press conference and announces the sacking of Gottfried Helnwein and director Hans Kresnik ...

Cooperation with German playwright Heiner Müller and choreographer Hans Kresnik on a play about Antonin Artaud.
Heiner Müller says about Helnwein: "How does a friendly person like Helnwein stand making his - excellent - painting into a mirror of the terrors of this century? Or is it that he can't stand not doing it?" ...

Helnwein's photographic work from 1970 to 1989 is published by Dai Nipon in Japan. Text by Toshiharu Ito.
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1988 Large installation in the city center of Cologne, between the Ludwig Museum and the Cologne Cathedral: "Neunter November Nacht" (Ninth November Night).
A four-meter-high, hundred-meter-long picture lane in which Helnwein recalls the "Reichskristallnacht", the beginning of the Holocaust, on 9 November 1938. He confronts the passersby with larger-than-life children's faces lined up in a seemingly endless row, as if for concentration camp selection. Just days into the exhibit, these portraits were vandalized by unknown persons, symbolically cutting the throats of the depicted children's faces.
Since then large scale installations in public spaces became an important part of his work ...

Set, costumes, and make-up for "Macbeth", a production of Hans Kresnik's choreographic theatre in the Stadttheater in Heidelberg.
The play is given an enthusiastic reception by audience and critics and is later awarded the Theatre Prize of Berlin ...

Participates in the exhibition "Selection 4" Polaroid Art of the last 10 years in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and in the "photokina" in Cologne.

Helnwein works simultaneously on a series of large-format, monochromatic-blue, realistic oil and acrylic paintings, as well as on a series of monochrome abstract paintings..