“Consideration of moral, ideological and ethical issues, are my central motifs, and are delivered by questioning the concept of the self.†Lothar Hempel explains. “The self here is fluid and dynamic, a social metaphor. It doesn’t have a beginning or an end.†Taking fractured identity as a bi-product of modernity, Hempel constructs his portraits with a sense of fleeting transience. Painted on paper, they are figures of fancy; two dimensional characterisations, their similar format making them interchangeable props. In Kreuzberg Night, his figure operates as a formalist construction, a blank projection of contours and colour-fields, their attributes and symbolism readily appropriated for viewer self-identification and imagination.
Quote from: Art: Concept Olivier Antoine