A WAR TO END ALL WARS
Triptych 2014
acrylic and oil on canvas
380 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm

LARGE-SIZED PAINTINGS.
LARGE-SIZED TRIOLOGY AS TRIPTYCH.

I share the opinion of the famous Norwegian painter Edvard Munch (1863-1944), that paintings contain not only a creative message as single piece. You can look at them also in a major conceptional context. This triology A WAR TO END ALL WARS combines three essential of my works (2013/2014) from aesthetic standpoints as well as with regard to contents.

"The war to end all wars" (sometimes also "the war to end war") is a very famous term of World War I, created in August 1914 and originally used in an idealisitc way. Young men in the trenches believed in that phrase, and it gave apparently a sense to all the bloodshed. After it was over, the world wanted to prevent such slaughter from ever happening again. Unfortunately, rather than end war, the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 set the stage for World War II.

The triptych combines following works and should "read" from left to right:

"VALHALL IN AUTUMN"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2013, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
left part of the triptych

"NOVEMBER AT THE SOMME"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2014, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
center part of the triptych

"LET US BUILD A NEW JERUSALEM II"
arylic and oil on canvas, 2013, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
right part of the triptych

* * * *

"It is good that war is so horrible, or we might grow to like it."
- Robert E. Lee

SEA AND SKY AND MELANCHOLIA AT THE END OF SUMMER II
Triptych 2017
acrylic and oil on canvas
380 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm

LARGE-SIZED PAINTINGS.
LARGE-SIZED TRIOLOGY AS TRIPTYCH.

I share the opinion of the famous Norwegian painter Edvard Munch (1863-1944), that paintings contain not only a creative message as single piece. You can look at them also in a major conceptional context. This triology SEA AND SKY AND MELANCHOLIA AT THE END OF SUMMER combines three new and essential of my works (2015/2016) from aesthetic standpoints as well as with regard to contents.

Summer is over soon and the days getting shorter again. Autumn is on the way. We feel the last warm breeze on our skin. Blue surrounds us and is the dominant colour. We are in between summer and autumn, in between blossom and fading. But we are just bystanders, we have no right to a say in a matter. Sea and sky exist from the beginning to the end of all times. And what about us? Do we have collect enough precious summer moments to survive the cold and darker days? With every new year the summer feels shorter, and life too. Where are the endless summer months at the seaside, far away from daily routine, where are our younger and lighthearted days? Hope is beyond the horizon line. But we are fighters and we have nothing to fear. Sea and sky and sometimes also melancholia will accompany us. And we should remember Dylan Thomas and his poem: "Do not go gentle into that good night." Next summer will come. Farewell warming sun. This is not the finale.

The triptych combines following works and should "read" from left to right:

"UNTIL THE BLUE SKIES DRIVE THE DARK CLOUDS FAR AWAY"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2017, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
left part of the triptych

"WHERE THE WHITE WINDS BLOW"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2017, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
center part of the triptych

"COLD WATER BELOW THE SURFACE OF YOUR SOUL"
arylic and oil on canvas, 2016, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
right part of the triptych

* * * *

"Do not go gentle into that good night
Rage, rage again the dying of the light."
Dylan Thomas

UNTIL THE BLUE SKIES DRIVE THE DARK CLOUDS FAR AWAY
150 x 120 x 2 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas
2017

By the wan light - glass moon
In the autumn mist - winter's wasteland
Let us lay down - fall asleep
Do not wake up - do not breathe
Till the summer skies - white nights
Drive the blue clouds - dark thoughts
Far away - far from here.

* * *

“You cannot swim for new horizons until you have courage to lose sight of the shore.”
- William Faulkner

TIME IS DANCING FROM SUNSET TO SUNRISE
Triptych 2017
acrylic and oil on canvas
380 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm

LARGE-SIZED PAINTINGS.
LARGE-SIZED TRIOLOGY AS TRIPTYCH.

I share the opinion of the famous Norwegian painter Edvard Munch (1863-1944), that paintings contain not only a creative message as single piece. You can look at them also in a major conceptional context. This triology TIME IS DANCING FROM SUNSET TO SUNRISE combines three new and essential of my works (2016/2017) from aesthetic standpoints as well as with regard to contents.

One day from sunset to sunrise. One day and month, one season and year, one life. We are on a journey. There's no standstill. The clock is ticking. Carpe diem et memento mori. Time is dancing and fading. We all have a fate. But it's not of us to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. And so every day, every breath is precious and beyond retrieval. Scars remind us of our history. The small and the big stories of our life. We don't remember every face and place. But we feel what we were and what we are. Carpe diem et memento mori – remember that you will die and seize the day.

The triptych combines following works and should "read" from left to right:

"LET ME BELIEVE (TRUE AT FIRST LIGHT IV)"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2017, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
left part of the triptych

"WHERE THE SUMMER NEVER ENDS"
acrylic and oil on canvas, 2016, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
center part of the triptych

"TO THE EDGE OF THE WORLD AND BEYOND"
arylic and oil on canvas, 2016, 120 (w) x 150 (h) x 2 cm
right part of the triptych

* * * *

"Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real."
- Cormac McCarthy (ex: All the Pretty Horses)

WHEN MORNING CONQUERS THE DARK OF NIGHT
2017
150 (h) x 120 (w) x 2 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas

In the darkest hour
As far as I can see
Stand my ground
Be the morning light
Post tenebras lux
Light after darkness

In the deepest sleep
As long as I can breathe
Stand close to me
Be my morning prayer
Lux omnia vincit
Light conquers all.

* * * *

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

THE TOWERS BEGIN TO FALL
2017
150 (h) x 120 (w) x 2 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas

Inspired by the history of the medieval Kingdom of Jerusalem and the fall of Acre 1291: We hardly remember the names and the knightly bravery of the defenders, we hardly imagine the deepness of their religion and Christian motivation, but the fall of Acre was one of the most important battles of that medieval period. It signaled the end of the Jerusalem crusades. Acre was the capital of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, a crusader state established by European Christian knights in the Southern Levant after the First Crusade in 1099. The kingdom lasted nearly two hundred years, from 1099 until 1291 when the last remaining possession, Acre, was destroyed by the Mamluks. Acre was well defended by knights, with two lines of thick walls and had twelve powerful towers (which were built by European kings and rich pilgrims). The siege began on the 6th April 1291. The Sultan's catapults battering the walls, Muslim troops attacked the walls day by day. Resistance weakened after six weeks of bloody defense and TOWER AFTER TOWER FELL TO THE GROUND in ruins. Muslim forces entered the streets on the 18th May 1291 and before nightfall Acre was in Sultan's hands and a massacre started. We hardly remember the names and the knightly bravery of the defenders, we hardly imagine the deepness of their religion and Christian motivation, but the fall of Acre was one of the most important battles of that medieval period. It signaled the end of the Jerusalem crusades. The Holy Land and the Kingdom of Jerusalem were lost forever.

In other but very true words:
“What's done cannot be undone.”
Shakespeare (ex: Macbeth)

FOLLOW INTO THE UNKNOWN
2017
150 (h) x 120 (w) x 4,5 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas

Leave a candle burning
Light to follow into the unknown
Hope to resist the rising dark
Words to unmask the wolf pack
Love to conquer the mares of night
Leave a candle burning
Lighten the path to your soul
And look into my face
You have seen me before.

* * * *

“The unseen enemy is always the most fearsome.”
- George R.R. Martin (ex: A Clash of Kings)

LET ME BELIEVE
(TRUE AT FIRST LIGHT IV)
150 x 120 x 2 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas
2017

In the last hour of the night
Our intentions are fine
And we believe in world's beauty
Till we betray what we're fighting for
Till all is aflame what we should love
Till first light will wake us up again.

To say it in different, but very true words by Hemingway:
"All things truly wicked start from innocence."

"True At First Light" is the title of the last published novel by the US-American novelist Ernest Hemingway, written until 1954, but first released by the son decades after his death.

BEFORE IT'S GETTING DARKER THESE DAYS (LANDS END SAN FRANCISCO)
2016
150 (h) x 120 (w) x 4,5 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas

Don't fear the dark
Leave a light on
Fires still burning
Stars still wandering
Beyond the horizon line

Take a walk at last light
Before it’s getting colder at night
Before it's getting harder to breath
From the sky and fountain to the sea
I pray you will be with me

Take my hand on secret ways
Before it’s getting darker these days
Before it's getting harder to leave
From all the stars and mountains to the sea
I hope you will be with me

* * * *

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
The deeper the grief, the closer is God!”
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (ex: Crime And Punishment)

* * * *
Inspired by San Francisco Lands End, by the fading beauty of autumn, announcing long and dark winter nights and by the poetry of Fyodor Dostoyevsky...

WAITING FOR THE SEA AT NIGHT
2016
150 (h) x 120 (w) x 4,5 cm
acrylic and oil on canvas

Where did we come from
Do you remember
Nights at the beach
A new world to conquer
A sky full of cold stars
But the cruel deep sea
This is not the way home
Where did we go wrong
Where will we go from here
Waiting for the sea at night?

* * * *

“I am longing to be with you, and by the sea,
where we can talk together freely and build our castles in the air.”
- Bram Stoker (ex: Dracula)