With His Paintings Trapped Abroad, This German Artist Had to Remake His Entire Show During Lockdown. See the Lively Results Here

“MARCEL EICHNER: ME”
Haverkampf Gallery

What the gallery says: “In the fall of 2018,
Marcel Eichner terminates the lease of his Berlin studio and moves
to Spain. He not only leaves Berlin, he makes a radical cut. In the
new surroundings, M.E. changes his method painting by painting. In
2020, he begins to create oil paintings with simple brush strokes
that directly deal with his environment. Introspective becomes
extrospective. A new beginning is taking place here. At least
that’s how it seems.

Back in Berlin to attend the funeral service of a friend, he
coincidentally ends up in his old apartment that he used to live in
15 years before. This is where he paints during the first lockdown
and discovers a canvas which he painted in 2005 in this very
apartment. It depicts the same subject, his old room, including a
view from the window.

Since it is currently not possible to transport the paintings to
Berlin that he created in Spain for this exhibition, he paints them
‘anew.’ New paintings based on the same principle, with a view into
the world that surrounds him.”

Why it’s worth a look: Hark! Galleries and
museums are beginning to slowly reopen in cities around the world,
and it is as exciting as the first blooms of spring poking out of
the cold ground. This show of paintings made “anew” in his Spanish
style by the German artist in light of the isolation of Berlin’s
lockdown, is a perfect entree into the new post-lockdown era: a
rumination on being inside and alone with one’s surroundings, but
maintaining a gaze out towards the future.

Like many artists before him, Eichner paints what he sees, in
this case a forced meditation on still lifes that functions as a
visual diary too. Through window panes we see time changing in the
colors of the day and night, the weather patterns, and blossoms on
the tree limbs, and see time literally passing in the paintings of
clock faces.

What it looks like:

Installation view, “Marcel Eichner: ME”
at Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Dalmantinervase I
(2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Fenster III
(2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, blaues Fenster
(Picasso) (2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf
Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Fenster I (2020).
Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Installation view, “Marcel Eichner: ME”
at Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Uhr (2020).
Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, grune Uhr (2020).
Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, eine Uhr (2020).
Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, jFenster mit Ast und
roter Ecke (2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf
Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, japanischer
Sonnenschirm II (2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf
Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Osterglocken
(2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Marcel Eichner, Osterglocken
(2020). Courtesy of the artist and Haverkampf Gallery.

Read more https://news.artnet.com/exhibitions/show-of-the-day-marcel-eichner-1858497