Art is my language. It connects the visible with the invisible.
born 1978 in Linz, Austria
Lives and works in Dresden
2020 – 2023
Direction of the life drawing course at Ateliergemeinschaft Kamenzer Straße, Dresden
2006 – 2023
Work in the costume department at Semperoper and Schauspielhaus Dresden
2007 – 2023
Work at Lebenshilfe Dresden e. V.
2006 – 2018
Deepening of drawing and painting practice in exchange with Prof. Werner Schellenberg
2011 – 2015
Direction of the life drawing course at art association "Kukulida", Dresden
2008
Dresser and tailor at Bregenzer Festspiele
2007 – 2009
Freelance theater education projects
2005 – 2006
Life drawing studies at HfBK Dresden with Prof. Werner Schellenberg
2005
Guest semester in theater sculpture department, work in the graphic workshops at HfBK Dresden
2001 – 2005
Studies in costume design at HfBK Dresden, diploma
2000 – 2001
Evening studies at HGB Leipzig
1997 – 2000
Training as fashion tailor in Leipzig
At the center of my work is drawing and the painting that develops from it.
I am drawn to engaging with the living and the immediate; the moment when I enter into non-verbal exchange with my counterpart, be it human or animal. Thus, for me, drawing is the transcript, the lasting record of a moment, a documentation of my reaction to what is directly seen.
In recurring encounters with what has been drawn, I deepen my perceptions, refine what has been experienced, and the drawing becomes a painting.
It begins with a thin, searching line that, in its uncertainty, slowly approaches the forms of a body. As it darkens and without lifting, it increasingly works out the forms. It moves in circles and jaggedly across the drawing sheet, later on the canvas, creating surfaces and volumes.
Thus, darknesses, shadows, and protruding areas of light are formed.
Color is added. Perhaps a radiant orange, which stands equal to a black charcoal line. The texture of the brush is highly visible on the raw canvas, which is only strengthened with bone glue.
Through destroying and rebuilding, structures emerge with which I continue to work. And so a body is formed from strong charcoal lines, intense color structures, vulnerable and defiant in its persistence—an expression of emotions and distorted beauty.
The unfinished intensifies its fragility and easy destructibility. It is the snapshot of a becoming, as fundamental and natural as the depicted life experiences. So too are the painting materials: inks, animal glue, linseed oil, and charcoal.
Frequent overpainting is not possible with the thin layers. From the first moment, the color line must have found its correct place and movement. If not, everything is destroyed from the ground up, washed away, and the search in the process begins anew.
Susanne Bartel