Hannah Eckstein Knihy

Jan Zö ller' s (b. Haslach im Kinzigtal, 1992; lives and works in Karlsruhe) art brims with personal references and experiences that he translates into his distinctive personal visual idiom. His paintings are theatrical arrangements for which he draws on a multifarious repertoire of motifs. Zö ller' s first monograph Keine Zeit zum Baden presents new works engaging with the exhibition space such as a floating installation with blue tiles from the exhibition of the same title at Stä dtische Galerie Ostfildern and videos and large-format paintings from the cycle Badebrunnen that were created between 2019 and 2022. The bathtubs in the pictures hint at private moments of relaxation; the fountains, at the " eternal cycle" of nature. The title Keine Zeit zum Baden (No Time for Bathing), then, gestures toward the subjects of the works, but also suggest the dilemma of striking a healthy balance between life, work, and one' s vocation.Jan Zö ller studied with Marijke van Warmerdam und Leni Hoffmann at the State Academy of Fine Arts Karlsruhe from 2012 until 2017 and with Jean-Marc Bustamante at the É cole Nationale SupÉ rieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris in 2016. He won the Federal Prize for Art Student

"No Artistas is part of our iconography and appears repeatedly in the pictures. Sometimes as 'No Art,' 'No Artists' or also as 'No Artistas,' primarily on the shirts of the Kissing Cousins. The whole thing arose out of a critical response to a narrow-minded conception of art. As always, we react with humor and don't take ourselves too seriously."(Mehmet & Kazim) - At the heart of these stagings is the representation of the familial connection through their alter ego, the Kissing Cousins, whose multifaceted depictions and translations belong to the established repertoire of figures that can appear onscreen as animated clay figures in video works or also in the form of Mehmet and Kazim themselves, clothed in red Adidas sweatsuits and Superstar shoes. The artist duo repeatedly draw the viewer into their red-and-white world, which is closely connected with their artistic biographies as the children of Turkish guest workers in Germany. The cousins share the name Akal which, translated from Turkish, means "white and red." -- (provided by publisher)

Die Malerin Ika Huber fand Ende 2022 in ihrem Archiv ein in einer Mappe zusammengefasstes Konvolut von 28 Zeichnungen aus dem Jahr 1985. Die kleinen Werke in Graphit und Tusche auf Transparentpapier waren alle im gleichen Format, von seriellem Charakter und bereits zu Reihen und Stapeln geordnet. Zudem fand die Künstlerin Skizzen und Aufzeichnungen, die die Erinnerung an ein altes, unrealisiertes Buchprojekt aufkommen ließen. Gemeinsam mit ihrem späteren Mann, dem Künstler Günther Förg, hatte Ika Huber 1984 die Idee zu einem Katalog mit ihren Zeichnungen, für den er den Gestaltungsentwurf anfertigte. Im Jahr darauf entstanden während eines Gastaufenthaltes in der Villa Romana in Florenz die Arbeiten dazu. Die Zeichnungen entsprechen dem damaligen künstlerischen Standpunkt Ika Hubers und behandeln Zitate klassischer Architektur und Skulptur. 38 Jahre später erscheint nun dieses Buch und zeigt eindrücklich die Werkgenese von Ika Huber, deren Arbeiten sich damals von der figürlichen Tradition der Karlsruher Akademie lösten und zu den heutigen, abstrakten Bildräumen formten.