About Art
Art is a way of deciphering existence. To focus on something other than the obvious through playful associations.
I work in the intersection between thought models and everyday impressions. I am drawn to the worn: To materiality and craftsmanship where the subject shines through. Sometimes I am driven by an idea.
“Glad you have something to do,” a neighbor said as I stood working on some sculptures for my latest exhibition. Funnily enough, I received the same comment over 40 years ago from a colleague at the welding company I then worked at when showing my paintings at the companys canteen. Both said in all good sense and with a reasonable perspective on my business. In their eyes, I might as well have used my creativity to renovate old American cars, build mini golf courses or tie fishing flies.
And maybe so, but for me it was Art that channeled my need for expression. Without having formal art education, I have learned over the years how to do things and gained insight into how the art field works.
I think a lot when I make art, I’m a reflective human being. The images come as the result of an associative flow of thought. Sometimes I reflect on the reflection itself and make pictures of that too. In this way, it is a philosophical activity. But I make the pictures on feel, it’s not like welding together a machine part where everything should be right and proper. No, with art, it’s like with the blues. There must be a splash of erraticness, otherwise it will just be boring and decorative.
About the world
Once again we must invest an unreasonable amount of resources in defending ourselves against each other. Despite all the well-meaning values and solemn declarations, the world is now determined by the fundamental conflict resolution that has characterized humanity since the Neolithic Revolution: The War of Territories. (from gang settlements to revanchist geopolitics) The basic urge to subjug and kill. As if we didn’t have more important issues to deal with.
At the same time, the same humanity, through an outstanding global collaboration, has managed to photograph the black hole in the center of the Milky Way. Reality has many layers.
About life
We are like vessels in the stream of time. Experience machines that devour impressions and process them into meaningful images.
We make them in the moment, in the short span between then, now and an uncertain later. Useless images fade away while new ones take over. Our memory is selective, most of it is forgotten.
Images are made because they want to be made.
Reflections on the quantum mechanical foundations of existence and how to portray the nature of time are mixed with observations of crows’ family life and the need to bring home food. Because somehow everything is connected.
We are like vessels in the stream of time. Alone we bob along, marked by the circumstances we grew up in, by genes, social structures, life experiences and group affiliations but ultimately as autonomous individuals. We make our observations and try to navigate as best we can.
I don’t always know where my images come from; a time capsule, an object in four dimensions or a trilobite, but I trust my intuition. They are sifted through my subject and are my way of reflecting the present as an artist. Perhaps not what happens on the surface but rather what bubbles up in the undercurrents.
What requires the slightly slower pace of art to take in.