His work reflects the influence of socialist realism, and owes a debt to Surrealists Giorgio de Chirico and René Magritte, although Rauch hesitates to align himself with surrealism.

Rauch's paintings suggest a narrative intent but, as art historian Charlotte Mullins explains, closer scrutiny immediately presents the viewer with enigmas: "Architectural elements peter out; men in uniform from throughout history intimidate men and women from other centuries; great struggles occur but their reason is never apparent; styles change at a whim.

With an estimated fortune of €100 million, he was ranked one of the richest 1,001 individuals and families in Germany by the monthly business publication Manager Magazin in 2017.

In the catalog text, Lauter referred to Rauch‘s combinatorial principle of sampling, incorporating elements from art history, paraphrases of surrealism and metaphors of the banal everyday world.

[11] Rauch won the Vincent Award in 2002, which received a corresponding solo show at the Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht, The Netherlands, that same year.

In 2007, the Galerie Rudolfinum in Prague held a retrospective entitled "Neue Rollen," organized by the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, of Rauch's works covering 13 years.

I am deliberately neglecting to contemplate all of the catalytic influences that would have the power to undermine the innocence of this approach because I would like to express a degree of clarity in these lines by way of example.

I view myself as a kind of peristaltic filtration system in the river of time ...[17]Rauch is considered to be part of the New Leipzig School and his works are characterized by a style that depends on the Social Realism of communism.

In the US, Roberta Smith, art critic for the New York Times, called attention to Rauch's work in 2002 with an article about the "painter who came in from the cold.

"[18] In 2007, Rauch painted a series of works especially for a solo exhibition in the mezzanine of the modern art wing at the Metropolitan Museum in New York City.

Calling them "visions" reflects my personality—they precede inspiration and spring from the moment when internal images appear at the prompting of intellectual decisions.