Exhibition Badischer Kunstverein

Well-Oiled
Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe (Germany)
16.02. – 07.04.2002 / Opening on Febr. 15, at 7:00 p.m.

on Friday, Febr. 15, at 11:00 a.m.

The painter Jochen Schambeck who lives in Karlsruhe is presenting paintings from two new work series with the allusive title of “Well-Oiled”: the rather small blossom paintings (“Grow Out”), and the tanker paintings (“Well-Oiled”), some of which are large.

The distinguishing characteristic of both series is the use of a tremendous amount of paint which, with respect to the blossom paintings, replicates the object like a sculptural mimicry, and results in whole paint cans “floating” in the sea of oil paint in the tanker paintings.

With these pictures Schambeck succeeds in a unique way in evoking the current context of finding a means of expression while at the same time not abandoning the framework of classical painting. This ambiguity, of representation and painted reflection – at times with traces of relish and irony - pervade all his work in recent years.

While the tanker paintings hint at the supposed reality of media pictures (accidents, catastrophes, etc.) they also convey a sobering effect on the viewer by combining precious materials (oil paint) and garbage (empty oil cans). And on a third level they appear to be self-portraits of the artistic process: paintings that use material and media to study “drowning” in colour.

In contrast to the stories of the tanker paintings, the “Grow-Outs” ossify like colourful baroque bouquets of a natura morta. The oil paint piles up to more than ten centimetres forming sculptural blossoms that melt into each other. The surface of these paintings no longer creates illusions; it simply consists of the sculptural material of paint. These paintings, which superficially conceal more than they reveal of their substance, must be left to dry for months due to their tremendously thick layer of paint.

Jochen Schambeck, who was born in Bremervörde in 1964, studied graphic arts and painting at the State Academy for Fine Arts in Karlsruhe under Prof. Horst Antes and subsequently at the State Academy for Fine Arts in Stuttgart under Prof. Sotirios Michou.

His solo exhibition at the Badischer Kunstverein is accompanied by a catalogue with numerous colour illustrations and texts by Prof. Klaus Gallwitz and Angelika Stepken.