monomodul - Raum für Kunst, Aachen

Opening: 20.05.2011

Duration: 21. 05.  –  02. 07.2011

Introduction: Susanne Prinz

(...) On closer inspection, however, it quickly becomes clear that Pedro Boese's finely sanded and scraped picture surfaces tell less of distance than of great closeness to painting and the struggle to inscribe new dimensions into the surface. In this respect, the physical effort associated with the interventions on the picture panels could also be interpreted as a psychologically motivated attempt to escape the grip of history. After all, it gave rise not only to the laws of painting but also to the principle of the avant-garde, the idea that man can always reinvent himself, indeed, as an artist he must. It had been firmly believed that our perceptual apparatus would change and that the suffering of incessant change, of the ambivalences of modernity, would be transformed into pleasure. But things turned out differently than hoped. As an artist today, you can't help but face up to the lack of faith that everything could always be completely different. This is exactly what Pedro Boese does in his new works with the contradictions of order and chaos inscribed in them.

Text: Susanne Prinz - Abstract from the essay The Trouble with Painting – Über die Schwierigkeiten beim Malen published in the catalogue monomodul on occassion of the exhibition, Aachen, 2011

Fotos: Jörg Hejkal