Reasons to be cheerful

What may sound like a provocation at first glance is more of a condition here.
All the reasons to be cheerful for: the winking eye of a friend, the time devoted to one, the long-cultivated craft. In this exhibition, three positions come together that differ mainly in their perspectives, yet they have something in common: the reference to our reality and a certain longing. And where longing is inherent, there is also hope.

Dragutin Banic (*1979) lives and works in Cologne. He studied at the HBK Braunschweig from 2006 to 2012 and graduated as a master student of Prof. Walter Dahn.
Dragutin’s painting is playful, poetic and deceptive. Like a flaneur walking with his head down and his eyes open, his paintings invite us to take a path through alleys and backyards where one never had the courage to walked through before. Leftover bricks, open bins, stubbing cigarettes or a glowing sign pointing to the back entrance of a cinema. Abstract settings meet allegorical conditions that point to something else.
Each of his works, large or small, looks quickly painted, even sloppy in execution. Painted with rabbit glue, pigment, oil pastel or egg tempera, areas of color appear impulsively composed and figurative elements are displayed as hasty actors in a kind of backyard comedy. And yet, it is quite different. Dragutin Banic takes his time. The biggest part of his practice is to look. The painting follows the mature gesture of an artist who is not afraid to take the time to really have a look.

The work of Francois Hinfray is no different as it may seem. In the apparent logic of the composition, the feigned orientation hides a deep moving longing and poetry. Be it the strict belief in color or in music. If one takes the time to look closely, these rhythms of which he speaks would be recognized. The rhythms of the pre-Columbian cultures, the Oceanians or the Aborigines. One spot something like a sound, an inner, cosmic composition. Francois wrote about his works:

“In the same way that a mandala is not a painting, traces in the sand of a Zen Garden not a drawing, a menhir not a sculpture, I seek to provoke contact with a sacred, mysterious, timeless dimension, far removed from any unambiguous message.”1

It’s this intriguing ornamental, religious and almost decorative aspects in his work that imparts a timeless quality. The decorative traditions of craftsmanship have long been positioned in opposition to the fine arts, and are also to be found in folk art, but Francois and Sóley are turning things on their head and drawing our attention to the artistic value of the decorative as something that also has the right to occupy a space in a contemporary exhibition.

Sóley Ragnarsdóttir (b. 1991) is a Danish/Icelandic artist who lives and works in Thy. She graduated from the Städelschule in Germany, under Amy Sillman and Monika Baer. Behind her personal, political and sculptural approach to painting, Soley is foremost an Artist who puts a large Amount of Time into her work.
Nothing is lost, amber, shells, sea-cut glass shards and marine sculpture are worked and appreciated to the smallest detail and processed into her paintings. Their meticulous dedication in the shadow of our wastes makes you forget for a moment the banality of our time. And just as anyone looking at a white wall sees, in some form, their own loneliness. Soley Ragnarsdottir sees the opportunity to remind you that there are plenty of reasons to be cheerful.

1. Artist Statement by Francois Hinfray 2023 2. Jean-Christoph Ammann “Die Utopie in sich selbst finden“ 1994

Christopher H. Gerberding