Luc Tuymans
02 Mar - 12 May 2008
Luc Tuymans
when springtime is coming
2 March 08 - 12 May 2008
‘every image is incomplete, just as every memory is incomplete.’
the belgian artist luc tuymans’s (*1958) paintings are unique in their intangibility, their mysteriousness and stillness. luc tuymans paints figuratively and yet his pictures deny a palpable legibility. the motifs are often not clearly recognizable, they are reduced to contours and seemingly hover in front of a placeless and dateless background, always threatening to dissolve into nothingness. tuymans’s works are defined by the stylistic methods of film and photography – unusual details, close-ups, the aesthetics of stills. it is characteristic for his paintings that the colour palette is very reduced, adding something nebulous or phantom-like to the paintings and evoking the impression of pictures from a faded memory. one of the central themes in luc tuymans’s work is the disastrous events of previous and most recent history such as the holocaust or 9/11 – motifs that for a long time were deemed not presentable. the artist consciously avoids large gestures in his pictures: they seem undemonstrative and quiet; his way of painting is always reserved. tuymans also never directly shows the incidents or the horror, but instead focuses on the moments before or after, on something incidental or banal – for example on objects or buildings that function as silent witnesses of history. through colour, perspective and light, he subtly indicates an eeriness and charges even quotidian image motifs with a sensed profundity.
tuymans’s works can be read as allegories of memory: certain pictures or aspects appear brightly, others disappear in the dark. memory can be deceptive, subjective and patchy. for this reason tuymans employs blurriness, a shadowiness and omission as a visual medium.
luc tuymans is one of the most outstanding exponents of contemporary painting that deals expressly with questions of presentation and presentability. already at the beginning of the 80s, as one of the first artists of his generation, he began to search for the meaning of painting in a media-centric world. since then tuymans consistently refers back to existing images such as polaroids, video stills or illustrations from newspapers, thereby referencing the formative influence mass media has on our imagination and memories. for the artist the power of contemporary painting lies in its resistance towards the flood of images, achieved through slowness and tradition. even if it is incapable of creating something genuinely new, it nevertheless provides multiple possibilities for reflection and viewing things afresh.
the exhibition brings together the artist’s paintings from the last 30 years, as well as a wall drawing, which he created especially for this exhibition. the connection between the place of an exhibition and his own work, the tension-filled area between history and the present, is important to tuymans when presenting his works: in the haus der kunst’s monumental exhibition spaces with its green-white overhead lighting, which tuymans refers to as ‘deceased light’, mirrors the way in which tuymans deals with emptiness and space in his paintings.
in cooperation with
the mücsarnok kunsthalle, budapest
and the zacheta national gallery of art, warsaw
www.hausderkunst.de
when springtime is coming
2 March 08 - 12 May 2008
‘every image is incomplete, just as every memory is incomplete.’
the belgian artist luc tuymans’s (*1958) paintings are unique in their intangibility, their mysteriousness and stillness. luc tuymans paints figuratively and yet his pictures deny a palpable legibility. the motifs are often not clearly recognizable, they are reduced to contours and seemingly hover in front of a placeless and dateless background, always threatening to dissolve into nothingness. tuymans’s works are defined by the stylistic methods of film and photography – unusual details, close-ups, the aesthetics of stills. it is characteristic for his paintings that the colour palette is very reduced, adding something nebulous or phantom-like to the paintings and evoking the impression of pictures from a faded memory. one of the central themes in luc tuymans’s work is the disastrous events of previous and most recent history such as the holocaust or 9/11 – motifs that for a long time were deemed not presentable. the artist consciously avoids large gestures in his pictures: they seem undemonstrative and quiet; his way of painting is always reserved. tuymans also never directly shows the incidents or the horror, but instead focuses on the moments before or after, on something incidental or banal – for example on objects or buildings that function as silent witnesses of history. through colour, perspective and light, he subtly indicates an eeriness and charges even quotidian image motifs with a sensed profundity.
tuymans’s works can be read as allegories of memory: certain pictures or aspects appear brightly, others disappear in the dark. memory can be deceptive, subjective and patchy. for this reason tuymans employs blurriness, a shadowiness and omission as a visual medium.
luc tuymans is one of the most outstanding exponents of contemporary painting that deals expressly with questions of presentation and presentability. already at the beginning of the 80s, as one of the first artists of his generation, he began to search for the meaning of painting in a media-centric world. since then tuymans consistently refers back to existing images such as polaroids, video stills or illustrations from newspapers, thereby referencing the formative influence mass media has on our imagination and memories. for the artist the power of contemporary painting lies in its resistance towards the flood of images, achieved through slowness and tradition. even if it is incapable of creating something genuinely new, it nevertheless provides multiple possibilities for reflection and viewing things afresh.
the exhibition brings together the artist’s paintings from the last 30 years, as well as a wall drawing, which he created especially for this exhibition. the connection between the place of an exhibition and his own work, the tension-filled area between history and the present, is important to tuymans when presenting his works: in the haus der kunst’s monumental exhibition spaces with its green-white overhead lighting, which tuymans refers to as ‘deceased light’, mirrors the way in which tuymans deals with emptiness and space in his paintings.
in cooperation with
the mücsarnok kunsthalle, budapest
and the zacheta national gallery of art, warsaw
www.hausderkunst.de