A portion of massive long-hidden early work by star German painter Gerhard Richter will soon be returned to public view after more than 40 years at a museum in Dresden. A portion of the roughly 63-square-metre mural “Lebensfreude” (Joy of Life) will be put on display with the artist’s consent during a public exhibition at the German Hygiene Museum that will run from March 9 to November 17. Richter, a native of Dresden, was given the task of painting the wall at the end of 1955 as a final assignment as a 24-year-old student at Dresden’s Academy of Fine Arts in what was then communist East Germa…