Under the Surface.
a thematic examination of the transformative power of water
I liked the idea of circularity and connection with the element of water, which is the source of all life, and the ambivalence underlying it, as water can also be a life-threatening place where you can drown or even freeze to death.
I also wanted to address people's alienation from their nature. Man is inextricably linked to his nature.
We consist largely of water and cannot survive without water, just as the entire planet lives from and through water. And yet, with a certain passivity and ignorance, we alienate ourselves from our own substance. So modern people give themselves the illusion of being separate from it. There is an ambivalent relationship with ourselves and our substance, which we interpret as something “external” even though it is immanent to us. In this series of images I used water as a symbol of transformation, as a sacred element and life essence, for purity and wisdom, depth and spiritual meaning, connection, and circularity.
Aquarell.
For me this series made with watercolour was primarily about connection, the merging of people with their substance.
The reflection on the water surface represents the reflection of one's own being.
This series of images is related to interpersonal relationships, vulnerability and self-reflection.
Seperation is the biggest illusion that deceives us. We are connected through and with our fluidity, even though we seem to create a layer between our nature. It almost feels like a vouyeristic act, as if a layer of glass stood between us, even though it’s see through.
I delve even deeper into this topic with a series of pictures that I called “sobre el cristal” (“behind the (glass) pane”).
I worked on 30x30cm panels and painted blurry figures that seem to disappear behind a pane of glass on which you can see raindrops.
Thematically, my aim here was to address the illusion of separation.
The egoism or individualism that neoliberal, capitalist ideologies impose on us changes our focus and priorities. With the development of industrialization and the capitalist exploitation of people and their planet, there is a growing assumption that we have separated ourselves from nature.
However, this is an illusion.
We are an inseparable part of nature, but a layer seems to have slipped between us and our natural behaviors and needs. We only look at the world as if through a window or a screen and perceive natural processes as voyeuristic, even though we are still part of them.
lluvia sobre el cristal 1, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 2, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 3, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 4, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 5, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 6, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 7, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 8, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 9, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 10, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 11, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
lluvia sobre el cristal 12, oil on canvas, 30x30cm, 2024
the water we become, oil on canvas, 2024
interference, acrylics on canvas, 2024
wasserscheu, oil on canvas, 2024
a series confronting the transformative power of the element water
I then dealt with the different aggregate states as universal circulation processes and tried to personify them. In a series of three oil paintings I have created characters that are representative of an aggregate state of the hydrological cycle, blending and becoming one with their surroundings.
The connection between humans, nature and their environment is shown in this series. I also wanted to show a visual level of interpretation of microcosm and macrocosm in the context of water as the underlying essence of life.
The transformative and cyclical power of water, which not only flows through clouds, rain, open water and ice, but also through us living beings, should come into its own in these images and be figuratively processed.
frozen solid, mixed media on panel, 50x50cm, 2024
fluid, mixed media on panel, 50x50cm, 2024
evaporate, oil on panel, 50x50cm, 2024