T e c h n i q u e a n d w o r k i n g p r o c e s s
W h y o l d c a r s ?
I am interested in the process of melting, welding and combining metal. As a basic material for my works I use metal sheets of old or wrecked cars, a material which, in my opinion, provides more than only the basis of my work. It also inspires me because of its original colour which remembers us of the status symbol a car represents. This stands in a very sharp contrast to the worthless old car.
Neither recycling as such nor the car influenced my choice of material but the idea to create something new.
T e c h n i q u e
First of all, I select the metal sheet which I cut into pieces. I then anneal the pieces in order to take most of the original colour off. So in a way we could say I do the opposite of a painters job. Later I weld the different pieces together again and by so doing give them a new meaning. After polishing my object I finally spray it with just the paint the wretched cars were originally painted with. And last but not least I fire my "metal pictures" in order to put the final touches to it.
Welds and scars show that different metal sheets have been combined.
I consider the welds as scars and these scars will always be visible and are therefore part of my work. These scars and welds connect on the one hand different pieces of cars from all over the world and on the other hand give my "metal pictures" a special expressiveness.
The raw material I use often has bulges and a three-dimensional appearance which are signs of a car-crash. However, the car-crash as such is not the theme of my work. Rather serves its three-dimensional structure as an inspiration and basis of my "metal pictures".
Although the car is not theme of my work I never disguise elements like punch-holes or gaps in the metal sheet.
So, to sum up, the car and its metal sheet represents the material I work with and may be an inspiration but is never theme of my work.
Creative process and philosophy of my "metal pictures"
Combination of taking the original colour off and later painting the work
Despite the fact that there exist so many different colours of cars I can hardly ever just choose the colour I originally had in mind for one particular object. It sometimes takes ages to find the right car pieces and I invest al lot of time to collect the metal sheets and to compose my works. This process of choosing the pieces and composing the objects is most challenging and it always surprises me that all the different car colours of all over the world somehow match. With every new work I am astonished how the playing together of the plain metal and the original colour of the status symbol and the new paint give my "metal pictures" a special touch. There is much contrast in my works. We could say that we always have the old car and its maybe faded paint in mind and at the same time are looking at a shining new object in bright colour and plain metal.
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