Unstable Talismanic Rendering (with gratitude to master marbler Dirk Lange), 2014
Information about the artwork
- MaterialInk and solvent on paper
- Dimensions282.7 x 182.9 cm
- Year of acquisition2014
- Inventory numberUAB 909
- On viewOn view
- Copyright© Kerstin Brätsch. Photo: Haydar Koyupinar, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Museum Brandhorst, Munich
More about the artwork
Artist Kerstin Brätsch has created an exceptionally diverse body of work: paintings on paper and polyester film, photography and slide series, glass pieces, marbling, and also performances and collaborative projects. Yet this variety is permeated by a consistent concern with painting—both as a medium and as a historical frame of reference. The large-scale marbling works entitled “Unstable Talismanic Rendering” are part of a series that Brätsch began in 2013. Their abstract forms invite manifold associations and convey an archaic quality inherent to the technique itself. In marbling, colors are applied to a glue bath and manipulated on its surface before a sheet of paper is laid into it, capturing the pigment. What may seem straightforward requires great artisanal skill, which Brätsch acquired with the guidance of the marbling master Dirk Lange. Each element begins with a drop of color that can be altered with various tools, though the process does not allow for painting in the traditional sense. The works emerge in plain view without a fixed top or bottom. Brätsch therefore likens the glue bath to a flatbed scanner—an apt comparison, as the color rests on the paper like a film and does not produce the haptic depth usually associated with paint’s materiality.
