Friedrich Einhoff

Dunkelkammer

Sep 25th – Nov 6th, 2012

Hans Ludt

Hans Ludt, 2002

Acylic, charcoal, sand on canvas

150 x 115 cm

“Friedrich Einhoff’s painting can be understood as a subtle evolution of modernity’s central achievements. On the one hand, at the heart of his work, is the human figure, its formal reduction and expression; on the other, is the prevalence of elements that at first seem to resist representation. Amorphous forms extend the picture surface but also suggest abstract bodily shapes.

Einhoff’s painting proceeds from lines and contours that are distinct yet searching. His color palette is decidedly reserved – gray and brown hues dominate – with only the occasional coloristic accent. The proximity to drawing is palpable, even in his large-scale works. From large swaths of the canvas he removes the colors after he applies them, creating the grainy appearance of surface etching.

Einhoff’s use of schlieren, shadows, and abrasions – ever more dominant over the years – recalls paintings and photographs exposed to water, fire, or other kinds of damage. Einhoff’s technique exposes precisely what a painted image and an analogue photograph share on the material level: surfaces coated with substances that change with time. The title of the exhibition Darkroom refers to that process of artistic creation. (text after Ludwig Seyfarth)

Friedrich Einhoff, born in Magdeburg in 1936, studied with Alfred Mahlau and Willem Grimm at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg from 1957 to 1962, where he was honored with the Plakette in 2008. In connection with the Hans Platschek pirce in 2009 an extensive monography was published.

On the occasion of the exhibition a catalogue is published at Kerber Verlag.