Mental Driftwoods and the Approach to Abstraction

For the exhibition Bikini on Mars / Anton im Bastrock in 2020, six large-format paintings—the series Mentale Treibhölzer (Mental Driftwood)—were created for the Corner Space of Galerie Thomas Schulte. They were hung in the large window front of the gallery in such a way that they were visible from behind the glass looking out onto the busy street. The paintings were created spontaneously, intuitively, and painted by the artist, not with brushes, but with his bare hands. While working on the pieces, the artist was visited in his studio and talks about the creation process and the interaction between artist and painting, conscious approach and unconscious execution that drives the artist.

Each painting is unique and separate from the others: they do not complement each other to form a Gesamtwerk, but instead appear as isolated and equal components of a collage. It is only during the painting process that a structure gradually crystallizes and through which a composition emerges. The artist sees the works as hybrids that have become alien to him. Through them he questions the origin of abstract pictorial ideas. The tone of the work is set by the first color of paint chosen by the artist. The format of the paintings is determined by the location of the work. All that follows is unplanned. Such a painterly process might incite the viewer to question the degree to which the images are products of conscious decision-making, or whether, like driftwood, they may have been washed up to the surface from the artist’s subconscious.