Eberhard
Havekost
Bowling 2
2000, Oil on Canvas
200 x 200cm |
Based
in Dresden, Eberhard Havekost often paints the city’s
modernist-style buildings as a means to reference 20th
century post-war politics and failed utopian vision. Havekost
explores the parallels between these systemic ideas of perfection
and the modes of ideal image construction. Working from his
own collection of photos and video footage, Havekost alters
the original images on a computer: hues are subtly altered,
forms imperceptibly stretched and skewed. These complications
are then further translated through the process of painting.
What Havekost presents isn’t photographic precision,
but rather transient moments of abstracted perception; the
intentional ‘errors’ make the image appear more
natural and visually pleasing. In Bowling 2, the
tower block has been altered in its perspective and lighting.
The attenuate distortion transforms an instance of banality
into one of harmonious beauty. |