A Prelude, 2022/23
A PRELUDE
Protagonists –
Cavalry
Debris
Harlequin
La Danseuse
Lost Paradise
Messenger
Mother and Child
Prince
Messenger: Is their soul neither deep enough, nor wide enough?
Harlequin: What is the correlation of light and innocence?
Prince: Core events lie before, if not behind us.
.........
I wanted to draw again. After the triptych installation The Side Chapel, and before an encompassing new body of work. Coloured pencils alone – soft, velvety, quiet, yet sharp. The images began to emerge. There was only so much I knew or could influence. Working back and forth between them; they were in constant dialogue. I would listen and follow, each picture guiding with full force. A woven-like quality came slowly to the fore. At times it felt like a power struggle, even their final number was not quite in my power. They took me back to German Romanticism, Hölderlin, the notion of the psychological landscape (Seelenlandschaft), the conundrum of scale, and traditional European tapestry. In the end, the images were protagonists in a short play.
Claudia Sarnthein, 2023
A PRELUDE
Protagonists –
Cavalry
Debris
Harlequin
La Danseuse
Lost Paradise
Messenger
Mother and Child
Prince
Messenger: Is their soul neither deep enough, nor wide enough?
Harlequin: What is the correlation of light and innocence?
Prince: Core events lie before, if not behind us.
.........
I wanted to draw again. After the triptych installation The Side Chapel, and before an encompassing new body of work. Coloured pencils alone – soft, velvety, quiet, yet sharp. The images began to emerge. There was only so much I knew or could influence. Working back and forth between them; they were in constant dialogue. I would listen and follow, each picture guiding with full force. A woven-like quality came slowly to the fore. At times it felt like a power struggle, even their final number was not quite in my power. They took me back to German Romanticism, Hölderlin, the notion of the psychological landscape (Seelenlandschaft), the conundrum of scale, and traditional European tapestry. In the end, the images were protagonists in a short play.
Claudia Sarnthein, 2023