The exhibition Vs. Frühwerk (Vs. Early Work) focuses on the individual (stylistic) development of artists. To this end, this multifaceted group exhibition juxtaposes one current work and one early work for each artistic position.
Has the work changed over the course of time, and in what way, or have completely new artistic paths been taken in the end?
As the term ‘Early Work’ can be defined in various ways, a time difference of at least 10 years was set as the simplest criterion. Very young artists must therefore draw on the treasures of their youth, while older artists can also present stylistic changes in the middle of their career.

The blacked-out images of the works shown in the exhibition (‘Late Works’) will only be revealed on this website after the end of the exhibition.

The work Langendreer was created in 1974, when I was primarily interested in my surroundings, which were characterised by the mining industry and its building culture, the traditional shops around the Langendreer market square, the still existing cottages and farms, the snack bars, the allotment gardens as well as „Haus Langendreer“, about which I made a documentary for the exhibition in the Bochum Museum on the subject of „Umbau der Stadt“ („Rebuilding the City“).
The woodcut Schatten-blau shown here was created in 2024 and was printed with 2 plates on a hand press. I have been fascinated by woodcuts and linocuts for many years, because I can vary the print results through the choice of paper and printing colours. I am very pleased that the BBK e.V. initiative has been celebrating the Day of Printmaking with nationwide exhibitions since 2019.
To describe my work over this long period of 50 years, the following keywords come to mind: Curiosity to explore and try out new things, risk-taking and carefree, pursuing ideas and realising these in a playful way, using all the media available to me.

www.helgabeisheim.de

In his biomorphic sculptures and installations, Linus Clostermann explores the contrasting relationship between artificial, industrially manufactured materials and forms that are modelled on living, growing organisms. Inspired by narratives from horror, fantasy and science fiction, he also develops site-specific works that combine parasitically or symbiotically with the exhibition architecture. Using self-developed techniques and unconventional tools, he creates detailed surface structures that appear as a recurring element in many of his works.

www.linus-clostermann.de

www.instagram.com/linus.clostermann

In 10 Minuten from 2009, 10 performers subjectively estimated the time that passed in front of the camera and thus measured it in their own pace. 10 years later, the work was repeated with all the performers still available, so that now not only the passing of the subjective 10 minutes is shown, but also the larger scale of the passing of the decade in the comparison of both works. This is more subtle and can at best be seen in the change of the performers' faces. The comparison of the two videos raises the question of whether people's perception of time changes as they grow older.

www.bjoern-drenkwitz.de

My artistic focus results from experimenting with the respective medium. Through the artistic treatment of everyday objects, situations and experiences, a creative process emerges that both documents the development process itself as well as producing reduced punchlines and situational stories. In principle, I work very associatively, processually and often in connection with writing.
Adding and experimenting with new materials expands the way in which I realise themes. The exploration of traditional boundaries in technique and forms of representation is what is exciting for me. By observing my environment and analysing the experiences and things that surround me, I create pointed scenes and stories that are reduced to the essentials in painting.
The addition of writing is usually the last step and, for me, signifies a kind of caesura or „final stroke“that completes the picture. My objects are often the result of a spontaneous action in which I incorporate repair and solution approaches from everyday life. The ideas develop organically from the respective theme, whereby I make sure that the history of the object remains clearly recognisable. I have chosen the juxtaposed works for purely formal reasons. It is up to the viewer to decide what kind of connection they see between the works.

www.alexanderendrullat.de

www.instagram.com/alexanderendrullat

"Martin Huidobro quotes signs and symbols from everyday life in his colourful paintings. He blurs the boundaries between painting, design, sculpture and architecture as a matter of course and opens up a world of meanings and references. The central theme in Huidobro's paintings, objects and installations is the object with its functional, aesthetic and evocative attributes. He reduces forms and colours to the essentials and presents us with a playful and tongue-in-cheek aesthetic survey of the world." (Thomas Weltner, curator)

www.martinhuidobro.de

www.instagram.com/martin_huidobro

In my work, I enjoy employing playfulness or „the toy“ to address profound themes both within my universe and contemporary society. Each object that emerges from my universe and my experiences, seeks to illuminate dark or contradictory aspects of life, ones we usually attempt to suppress or erase because they cast doubt upon our behaviour as rational beings. Nostalgia for a nowadays unreachable past is a recurring theme as well, which is utilised to find common ground with the viewer, building a bridge between the personal and the shared experience. By using a playful colour palette and materials, I aim to dissociate the aesthetic qualities of the work from its content. I’m interested in fostering contemplation through the use of humour, irony, and anguish conveyed by the playful object, by images situated between the grotesque, sinister, and the sweet simultaneously.

www.santiagoinsignares.com

www.instagram.com/insignaresart

In my work, I deal a lot with prevailing systems of society and power. At first glance, my often large-format and spatial abstract paintings on wooden panels are formally and aesthetically in the tradition of constructivism, colour-field or hard-edge painting. If one takes a closer look, one will realise that I certainly play with these influences, but that my work refuses to be categorised in the classical art-historical canon. Deliberate empty spaces, lines that lead to nowhere, broken or cut-out elements, high and low materials are confidently juxtaposed and combined with one another. The use of irritations and errors within my pictorial systems demands the involvement of the viewer, who is supposed to fill the blank space, to think the line further, to become part of the work and the artistic process. This act is seen as an attempt to dare to add more democratization into the art world. To allow recipients more autonomy in the viewing process and to question not only our existing systems of power, but also themselves. Why am I irritated at this point, why does this omission seem like a mistake to me? The aim of my work is to question our own conditioning of cultural reception and traditional ways of thinking and to establish new ways of viewing and participating from this reflection.

www.roman-lang.com

www.instagram.com/roman___lang

My work examines the interaction of light and space.
Lichtraum (Kokon) consists of many small packaging boxes. One day, empty boxes caught my eye. When I looked at them closely, it seemed to me that they were small rooms. I want to make these hidden spaces visible through light. Light is a sign that something is alive, inhabited - exists. By this I mean the „inner” spiritual light in people and the natural or artificial „outer” light that defines the space and makes it visible. I wanted to create an object that changes every moment with the natural light. The Space is filled by light and emptied by light. This shows liveliness and transience. When I take the discarded packaging boxes to breathe new life into them, it's like the caterpillar building a cocoon to transform itself. The process of repetition is almost like a meditative act for me.

www.jaejinpark.com

Iwona Rozbiewska’s main sources of inspiration are architecture, design, culture, and situations from her daily life. A continuous artistic experimentation with specific objects, concepts, or materials characterises her work. One of her first works, the installation Untitled (The Cemetery) from 2012 is an installation as sculpture, as design, and as object of use. Solids of various shapes, made of chipboard, painted with grey paint, arranged together, take the form of an abstract sculpture placed horizontally on the floor. Other times, the same solids present themself as architecture and interior design. Subsequently, they suggest the possibility of their use. This work was inspired by the forms of cemeteries, their architecture, as well as the structure of the human body. As Rozbiewska’s work progressed, the spiral and the themes of “openness” and “idyll” appeared as new motifs in her artworks, both as physical forms but also as recurring symbolism. In her recent works, Rozbiewska experiments with clay and creates hand-made ceramic tiles and bricks. She combines their minimalistic forms with oval, metal objects, covered with various paints or wood objects.

www.iwonarozbiewska.com

www.instagram.com/iwonarozbiewska

"[…] In the visualisation of the energies that determine our lives, their spatial expansion and structural movement patterns are visualised as an underlying condition of life. The dyed textile becomes a medium in which light combines with time to achieve a direct effect. Surprisingly, the two immaterial components produce visual spaces with a strongly physical, illusionist character. The three-dimensional volumes, with a realism that recalls photography, appear as the materialisation of an invisible process of complex interconnections. Their visual evidence is the inversion of a photogram, which transforms real objects into phenomena of light. Annette Wesseling speaks of her images maturing in the sun. The ripening fruits make something visible that is otherwise so matter of fact that it is overlooked, although it is always there: the shaping power of nature and its cyclical movement. It fundamentally defines our experience of the world and the way we survive in it as a reflexive alternation between inward and outward observation." (Sabine Elsa Müller)

www.instagram.com/annettewesseling

Fore-edge Painting (sometimes abbreviated to Fore-edge) refers to a hidden book edge decoration that is applied to the edges of book pages and is invisible when leafing through the book as well as when the book is closed. The painting only becomes visible when the pages of the book are pressed together and moved slightly towards each other. An image then appears on the book edge (fore-edges) (Wikipedia).
Here, however, something is different. The painting is not done on the book edge, but on canvas. Colourful stripes running vertically next to each other initially bring to mind the tradition of concrete art, but this is a deception. The offset cut, the fanning out of overlapping pages of magazines or books results in a pictorial template, which is then painted in great detail. The result is painting that appears abstract at first glance, but is in fact pure photorealism. The result is a series of large-format acrylic paintings. The templates were provided by the cut-outs of various issues of the magazine "Jazz Thing".

www.gittawitzke.de