Everything said
This is probably my most frequently revised blog post. It's hard for me to find the right words. What it's about: In my current painting series, I'm dealing with the stress caused by the ubiquity of fast, digital content.
I have done so much research on the subject that it seems to me that everything has already been said. Countless sources talk about dopamine kicks, changes in brain structures, loneliness and loss of focus.
As I am neither a scientist nor a journalist, I don't feel I can contribute to the debate on a factual level. Instead, I would like to take a subjective and artistic view.
Ambivalent
The feeling I want to express is my own ambivalence – my inner struggle between the seduction of constant entertainment and the creeping restlessness. This dull suspicion that it can't be good if I look at screens too much and experience too little of the ‘real thing’.
It is the attraction and the simultaneous overload of the virtual background noise, the constantly available and much-used distraction. In addition to everything that the smartphone makes possible, it has also slowly but surely taken something away from us: Breaks – those minutes of silence between duties and noise. When I look around me in public, it is omnipresent: we fill every second with content and take away the space to pause and reflect.
Our attention is so focussed on what's happening online that we start to miss our immediate surroundings. Words like doomscrolling, phubbing and brainrot determine the conversation. It is this disharmony with the digital that I try to capture in my images.
HaBits
My series title ‘HaBits’ refers to the fact that reaching for our smartphones has become an automatism that we hardly question any more.
I approached the subject emotionally, intuitively and, above all, analogue. The first images were the result of an experiment: I had been playing with paint and thought I could see a flickering screen.
I then developed the idea further and created a variety of motifs – some abstract, some figurative, with coarse application of paint, but also with sharp edges. Exuberant surfaces are juxtaposed with calmer ones, bright neon is contrasted with desaturated colours.
In addition to the black bars that I already worked with in the 'Privacy' series,
I use typical icons to create a link to what we see on screens today.
Live and in colour
I'll be exhibiting the extensive series at the end of the month, but I don't want to give everything away just yet. Just come and see for yourself!
Exhibition details:
Duo exhibition with Vitus Thanner
Vernissage: 27/02/2025 from 7 pm
Exhibition: 28 February – 9 March 2025 (Wed-Sun 12pm - 6pm / Mon & Tue closed)
Where: Nebbiensches Gartenhaus, Bockenheimer Anlage 3, Frankfurt am Main
I will be present at the vernissage as well as on the exhibition days.
Maybe this is a good opportunity for you to combine a nice, screen-free walk in the park with a look at art – and to take a little break from your own digital habits.
Comments