Shows
Group Show Galerie Fafou, 02.03.–17.03.24
I am happy to have been part of this group show at the gallery fafou in Oberuzwil.
7 of my paintings were on display. One of them was the old car repair shop you see here.
These paintings were priced in Bitcoin. And that raised some eye brows. Which is exactly what I intended.
My work is not post modernist, it is rather classical or conservative, but also neccessarily contemporary. The time I decided to become a full time painter coincided with the time I started to go down the infamous Bitcoin rabbit hole. But it took me a while to see the paralles.
I was never much taken with contemporary art. I prefer the old masters up to the impressionists. Of course, there is always exceptions. But the sheer level of skill they had to develop still mesmerizes me.
I decided to learn to paint the old way. It was and is hard work. To learn a skill takes time, a lot of it, and it never quite stops.
I started to see the connetions between the Art market today and the Fiat system (Central Banking). Most of the art today is what I call Fiat art. It is deemed to have value because some influential gallery says so. So is the Dollar or any other currency. Fiat art often is just a joke, a concept or idea and its execution predominantly does not require much skill or the skill is outsourced. Art has become the commodity of a 1.8 trillion asset class. Its main purpose is tax avoidance of the rich.
I chose the Proof of Work (PoW) path without relating it to Bitcoin first. As I said before, painting means learning to see. If you take a photograph and copy it, the seeing has been done for you by the camera. And learning to paint or draw without technical crutches takes time. All this, my inner state of mind plus the external reality manifest in an orginial one-of-a-kind picture.
The prevalent overrating of talent vs work is another clear sign of a Fiat Zeitgeist. I experience this constantly first hand. Most people think, it is just talent. The reason behind this is pretty simple: If it was indeed talent, they have the perfect excuse why thy are unable to do it. Some scientists contend it is 20% talent and 80% work. I say, it’s maybe 10% talent. Talent+Work=Skill.
The Fiat Zeitgeist is also the reason why these skills aren’t taught at Art Universities anymore. They require too much time and cannot fit the syllabus.
Many thanks to the fafou team!
Group Show Visarte Ost, 11.01.–08.02.24
The exhibition consists of the sum of works by Visarte Ost members who have produced works in A4 format. The exhibition shows the diversity of the works created in our region.
My contribution is called “Pig Farm II”. Oil on Panel, 30×21.5cm. Painted on 21.1.2021 near Balterswil, Switzerland.
It is part of a series of Pleinair Paintings having pig farms as the main subject. Normally landscape paintings just depict beautiful landscapes in a favourable composition. It can be understood as a critique of these mostly very ugly installations and the way we treat animals. You can only hear the screams of the pigs behind the walls, they cannot go outside. It is quite taxing to stand in front of one of these for hours and painting it.
The price of the artwork is denominated in Bitcoin for a reason: I believe that the base layer of our society is broken. Namely the way we exchange value. Our fiat-money is the root culprit in my opinion, because it can be inflated into oblivion. Meat is way to cheap, compared to the suffering it takes to produce it.
Wöschhüsli Oberneunforn, 15.09.–01.10.23
This is my first Solo Show. I was invited by the Cultural Commission of Oberneunforn to exhibit at the “Wöschhüsli”.
I painted at locations in and around Oberneunforn. I was not familiar with this beautiful part of the Thurgau. It was fun and I met a lot of good folks.
Thank you Oberneunforn, especially Niklaus!