Galerie Friese
Galerie Friese

CORNELIUS VÖLKER – VON A BIS Z

18. January – 01. February 2025

Opening
Friday, 17. January 2025, 7 pm

Introduction
Klaus Gerrit Friese, 8 pm

‘For me, the motifs are something like coefficients of resistance that painting has to test itself against,’ says Cornelius Völker. For more than 25 years, he has devoted himself to the objects and situations of our everyday lives and transformed them into his pictorial world. Völker's pictures are instantly recognisable - playfully light and supported by the tradition of art history, he has shaped his own form of still life painting, both stylistically and thematically. And yet the pictures could not be more different; he continuously explores the possibilities that painting can offer.

Two important series by Völker are the focus of the exhibition ‘Cornelius Völker – From A to Z’. A new series of twelve oil paintings on paper is dedicated to the theme of stacks of books: 26 books stacked on top of each other represent Völker's history of painting from A to Z. It begins with Frank Auerbach and ends with Anders Zorn, ranging from Caspar David Friedrich to Andy Warhol, from Simeon Chardin to Giambattista Tiepolo, to name just six of the 26 names that Völker has chosen as his favourite painters and, at the same time, representatives of a letter of the alphabet. In doing so, he creates an enigma and remains universally abstract in the deepest sense. 

The exhibition also features three new large-format flower paintings. In a sense, they are the purest manifestation of Völker's painting and painterly conception. At first glance, they are clearly recognisable as “still lifes”, but upon closer inspection, they call everything into question. The paintings open up a space for reflection on the act of painting and recording, on seeing and experiencing – similar to the momentary nature of their motif.

 

 

CORNELIUS VÖLKER – VON A BIS Z

18. January – 01. February 2025

Opening
Friday, 17. January 2025, 7 pm

Introduction
Klaus Gerrit Friese, 8 pm

‘For me, the motifs are something like coefficients of resistance that painting has to test itself against,’ says Cornelius Völker. For more than 25 years, he has devoted himself to the objects and situations of our everyday lives and transformed them into his pictorial world. Völker's pictures are instantly recognisable - playfully light and supported by the tradition of art history, he has shaped his own form of still life painting, both stylistically and thematically. And yet the pictures could not be more different; he continuously explores the possibilities that painting can offer.

Two important series by Völker are the focus of the exhibition ‘Cornelius Völker – From A to Z’. A new series of twelve oil paintings on paper is dedicated to the theme of stacks of books: 26 books stacked on top of each other represent Völker's history of painting from A to Z. It begins with Frank Auerbach and ends with Anders Zorn, ranging from Caspar David Friedrich to Andy Warhol, from Simeon Chardin to Giambattista Tiepolo, to name just six of the 26 names that Völker has chosen as his favourite painters and, at the same time, representatives of a letter of the alphabet. In doing so, he creates an enigma and remains universally abstract in the deepest sense. 

The exhibition also features three new large-format flower paintings. In a sense, they are the purest manifestation of Völker's painting and painterly conception. At first glance, they are clearly recognisable as “still lifes”, but upon closer inspection, they call everything into question. The paintings open up a space for reflection on the act of painting and recording, on seeing and experiencing – similar to the momentary nature of their motif.

 

 

WORKS