Irony and Intimacy Intersect in Lovers in the Backseat @ FeldbuschWiesnerRudolph in Berlin

“‘Lovers in the Backseat’ refers to romantic and intimate relationships. Everything we do happens because we can't help it: Breathing, living, loving and creating art, these are our common elementary needs." (A.N. & R.S.)

The connection between the works of Robert Schittko and Anna Nero lies in the exploration of identity, playfulness and irony, as well as a slight sexiness that resonates in both artistic practices. They take the exhibition visitor on the "back seat", behind their shoulders, on the motorway, country road or overtaking lane - always on the way, but where are they actually going...? Both Nero and Schittko harbor an aversion to self-referential art. Instead, they explore the self in their studios and transform their lives into a vivid artistic practice. Each in their own way: Schittko's sculptural and photographic art focuses on the development of their own identity. Nero provokes with her abstract-representational paintings and ceramics.

Lovers in the Backseat is on view through January 6th at FeldbuschWiesnerRudolph, Jägerstraße 5, 10117 Berlin.

Werner Büttner's "Malerei 1982-2022" @ Galerie Max Hetzler

Malerei 1981–2022 is a solo exhibition of Werner Büttner’s work at Galerie Max Hetzler, Bleibtreustraße 45 and 15/16 in Berlin. This is the artist's tenth solo exhibition with the gallery.

Absurdity, irony and ambivalence play a central role in Werner Büttner's paintings, which gained recognition in the late 1970s under the term ‘Bad Painting’. Motifs of classical modernism are reworked, sometimes with the help of linguistic elements, and thus become unflinching commentaries on society and the broader condition humaine. ‘The generation before us – the conceptual artists – had declared painting as an outdated, bourgeois medium to be abolished. This prohibition had to be broken by us descendants, out of defiance, for distinction, and because the laws of generation demand it. And so, in juvenile presumption, I took hold of almost all known categories of painting – still lifes, self-portraits, animal pictures, seascapes, history painting, religious subjects, etc.’, the artist explains.

This exhibition comprises works from a creative period of over 40 years, offering an impressive insight into Büttner's practice. The impasto painting, applied in rapid brushstrokes and alla prima (wet- on-wet), lends the works a coarseness that is further emphasised by the typical artist's frames made of wooden slats. Isolated splashes and streaks of paint, created by the explosive movements of the brush, reinforce the dynamism and power of the paintings. In the later works, this fast technique is replaced by a more precise painterly style, yielding images with a greater intellectual and visual subtlety. A block of drawings and a group of sculptures by the artist will also be shown at Bleibtreustraße 15/16.

 
 

Malerei 1981-2022 is on view until August 19th at Galerie Max Hetzler, Bleibtreustraße 45 and 15/16, 10623 Berlin