2021. 63 x 63 cm / 1280€

Gallery4 location: Brick wall

The blue here is quite a different one from the preceding work, FRECHEN, and it stems from another time. Two decades ago I was invited to a wedding in a lovely church of Mary in Bayern, and I was enchanted by the exquisite blue and gold of the ceiling.

Since then I invented a word, christening the color Maryblue, delighting in the way two words may be taped together in German to form one.  I began to notice ceilings in Maryblue wherever I went. How simple and naturally it covered the ceiling of the Wainscott Chapel in Bridgehampton on Long Island, with the same exact tone as that of the baroque German church. Each time I saw the color I felt uplifted, and eventually I find myself employing Maryblue in many of my paintings.  

If I would describe what Maryblue does, I’d say it turns our eyes upwards, to the ceiling or the sky. As a child, one of my favorite pastimes was to hang over the side of beds, chairs and couches and stare up at ceilings, imagining that it was the floor and I could live there, in that huge empty space, moving freely. As it was still without furniture, I could design it as I’d like. I think painting is like having that ceiling, now in front of rather than over me, empty and waiting for me to fill it. I can do with the open space whatever I like. Not surprising that I’ve created and directed a series of concerts over the last 25 years I named Room.  A few years later, the series of concerts turned into a yearly benefit concert, called Room for Peace. I suppose one might say that this is what I love to do. To make room, create spaces that hadn’t been there before, and then, at least in spirit, inhabit them. At best, they offer a room for peace.