Philipp Humm – Faust as Gesamtkunstwerk of the 21st century?
Sunday, 19 January 2020
London, film premiere of The Last Faust. Both the trailer and even just a brief look at Philipp Humm's Gesamtkunstwerk*, his total work of art (graphics, photography, oil painting and sculpture) which now comprises one hundred and fifty works, astonished me beyond belief. Yet what I see today in the cinema hall and will see in his studio tomorrow is absolutely beyond my expectations. A fascinating mix of surreal, bizarre, comical yet also oppressively visionary images draws me directly into a cinematic future of the world. A world, where artificial intelligence has taken control over planet Earth ...
- Published in Art projects, Digital Art, Events, Graphics, Mulitimedia, Painting, Photography, Sculpture, Studio visits, Video Art
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Stanislaw Trzebinski – Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Sunday, 15 December 2019
Cape Town. When entering the exhibition room I think, this is what the interior of Captain Nemo's Nautilus could look like in a remake of the Jules Verne-classic Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Rising before a mysterious dark background are fantastically shaped sculptures and the furniture of the artist and designer Stanislaw Trzebinski, who is only 27. The sculptures look like fossilised marine animals and plants which were initially salvaged from the bottom of the sea, then cast in bronze and finally brought to life by the injection of LED lights and fibre optics. The shape of the feet of the magnificent dining table and the structure of the striking etched brass plates on the wall also appear to be organically grown objects ...
- Published in Newcomer, Sculpture, Studio visits
Zander Blom – The Bad Reviews
Sunday, 24 November 2019
Cape Town. If this is not a true artist studio again! Works on paper drying on a washing line strung across the room, large-format canvases, side by side, waiting to be finished, piles of books, paint tins and endless numbers of crayons competing for floor space, while sketches, printouts and pages torn from magazines cover the tables. I am in the studio of Zander Blom, whose wild and explosive painting, at first glance, appears to be as naively playful as this room ...
- Published in Graphics, Installation Art, Painting, Studio visits, Video Art
Pieter Hugo – Constructed realities
Sunday, 03 November 2019
Cape Town. Looking at Pieter Hugo's photographs often makes you feel uncomfortable. You do not really want to look at them, but feel attracted none the less. This fascination extends to every one of his famous series of works, such as Looking Aside, Permanent Error, The Hyena & Other Men or La Cucaracha, his current project. What is so captivating about these pictures? During our conversation I am trying to find out. We meet in his in Cape Town studio ...
- Published in Photography, Studio visits
Marion Fink – Why am I flying on a giant rock through space?
Sunday, 15 September 2019
Potsdam. Today's studio visit takes me to Marion Fink, an artist, who caught the attention not only of current top galleries in Germany, but also of international galleries. Her remarkable paintings will be shown in London and New York before the end of this year. I want to find out what makes these paintings so special. Her studio – situated in a quiet street in a leafy part of Potsdam - is in a former Kindergarten that was transformed into a studio building. An austere stair case, an equally austere communal office in front of her studio, but then .... wow!
- Published in Graphics, Mulitimedia, Newcomer, Painting, Studio visits
Noah Becker – Say it loud!
Sunday, 18 August 2019
Berlin. Commissioned by Meet Pablo – totally unsuspecting of what is going to await me in "baketown“, an off-space in Berlin-Schöneberg – I find myself face to face with Noah Becker, a creative wizard. Whether it is music, fashion, interior design, films or even painting – he is everywhere. Today, my objective is to learn something about his painting which started here in his studio and which helped him through a difficult time ...
- Published in Newcomer, Painting, Studio visits
Chris Soal – Objet trouvé travels in time
Sunday, 21 July 2019
Johannesburg. Never before in my life have I seen so many fences and walls, usually topped by electric fences, and so few pedestrians. Strangely enough, there are very few parked cars. Of course I had heard that Johannesburg is plagued by high crime and serious socio-political problems. But, as I shall find out today, it is something quite different meeting people who grew up here and use art to discuss life in this city.
- Published in Installation Art, Newcomer, Sculpture, Studio visits
Anke Loots – Everything in its right place. Walkaround with Anke Loots
Sunday, 23 June 2019
Cape Town. I had no idea that the THK Gallery is an exhibition venue founded only eight months ago by – of all people – an inhabitant of Cologne, a person, therefore who just like myself, is from the Rhineland. Initially, it was the cover of the current first thursdays cape town* tour guide, which took me to Waterkant Street and thus to Frank Schönau and the artist, whose self-portrait graces the cover of the guide. It is the first solo exhibition of the 27-year-old Anke Loots, a student of the photographic artist Pieter Hugo, with whom – coincidentally ? - I also have an appointment at the end of the week ...
- Published in Exhibition reviews, Newcomer, Photography












