Busy making a series of small collage paintings on cardboard as designs for the new carpet brand MAREEN. Other than most of my art, these are done with just a little bit of colour and a lot of dusky white that covers the background like soft clay. They are abstract, but for me they have a vibe of architecture. Maybe cities in the dessert, seen from above. I just can’t help seeing something in everything.
While working, I listened to the song called „Rhapsody“ by my son Marin, who goes by the artist name of „Schlindwein“. It’s beautiful theme brought me into a meditative mood and mode of painting, just letting my hands guide me. Rhapsody actually means „songs stitched together“. In this case I was gluing bits of paper together and weaving them into each other with paint.
I have the feeling, the theme of these paintings will also inspire bigger canvas paintings – let’s see!
„Please send me some photos from your walks in the vineyards“, said my painter friend Sabina last fall, „I’d love to paint grapes!“. So I went up there and, although I live around the vineyards for many years now, I started seeing colours there I had never noticed before. My camera captured hues from dark, blackish blue and purple, to light pink, golden yellow, bright fresh green, crimson red and everything in between. I was spellbound and felt so inspired, that I started to paint grapes myself.
If you know me, you know, how much I like to use circles and dots in my paintings. So painting grapes felt quite natural for me. Yet grapes on paintings have a tendency to look either oldfashioned or kitschy somehow. And the difficult thing was, to develop a new take, while hanging on to the fascination of my first impressions.
So the first little sketches in colour developed into a whole series, that kept me busy for a whole year of painting. And next to making and drinking wine, painting wineplants and grapes is one thing, that is capable of making people forget their sorrows and dwell in most delicate moments of happiness. Or, I should also hope, looking at paintings, that capture the abundance and the magic that comes from this astonishing plant, that produces so much from almost nothing.
Look at more paintings from this series here.
Chees to you!
Since last year, I have been inspired by the theme of cocoa fruits.
Cocoa trees look like a piece of art or like an ancient goddess, generous, and abundant. Their huge fruits, containing the cocoa beans, grow directly from the trunk, full of earthly power and sweetness of nature. Once i saw, how cocoa grows, I understood more of the magic of chocolate – why people want it so much, and why it fills us with satisfaction and happiness.
It is also fascinating, to see the colours of the cocoa fruits, ranging from yellow to green to pink, red, violett, purple and maroon. I have not seen light blue ones so far, but could not resist using the pastel shades in my paintings, as they evoke a sense of delicacy and lightness.
