English Translation of exhibition reading "Neue Vorbilder" at Emmanuel Walderdorff Galerie, 26. April 2026

Even before the word and before the image, feeling approaches. What remains of it is a trace, a gesture in space. My Neue Vorbilder (pre-images, role models, examples) are conscious and genuine feelings and experiences, an autonomous matter that mutates from a natural excess of old structures and words into something new and seeks balance. As a human being and artist, I am a bridge, a tightrope walker in the space in between. As I sharpen my instinct and practice my awareness, patterns, categories, correction, and construction become increasingly quiet and superfluous. When something overflows, it does so out of the necessity to create balance. From this arises natural air pressure or artistic expression, and with it atoms move from one place to another, or feelings move from within me into the work. I do not paint onto the canvas, but into it, and in doing so the image we see is not merely a living object of contemplation, but also a biological self that is discharged through the viewer and, if necessary, becomes audible. The only thing we can truly understand through this is ourselves.

I place the image itself, with its color, technique, medium, and dimensions, and all their adjectives, in the background. What comes to the foreground is the primal ground, the essential nature, a sign as the beginning of a reduced language, the trace, a fragment of the human being who, through his existence and transformation, with body as form and spirit as content, attempts to achieve peace within himself and within the viewer; to be connected through brush or arrow, stretched between resistance and lightness, earth and sky.

Humanity now stands before new challenges, and every individual stands before their own mysteries and tangible decisions. Just as one day I stopped reaching for the bottle and the cigarette, today I reach for my essential nature in the brush, for the authentic human being and the independent self; I reach for my roots within structures, for the true role model and for transformation; I reach for my true existence in essence. Thus I do not dig into old wounds and I do not shoot into new clouds, but recognize the scar as a sign in the stone, as fresh, deep and alive as an imperfect experience. And there I see myself exposed, as a man suspended in midair, anchored in the violet roots of an oak, dancing on the black rope.

What holds me, if not lavender?

It is not I who am, but art that is.
It is not I who am silent, but art that speaks.
It is not I who paints, but art that presents.
It is not I who inspires, but art that is alive.
It is not I who wanders, but art that sits.
It is not I who feels, but art that moves.
It is not I who acts, but art that responds.
It is not I who am happy, but art that is happiness.
It is not I who am humble, but art that is peace.

When I claim that my work is the immediate expression of my feelings,
when I claim that the color lavender contains healing powers just as the plant itself does,
when I claim that an instinctive trail of oil leaves impressions as deep as the human being himself,
and when I claim that animals and plants carry within them qualities worthy of emulation, just as human gestures and their tools do,
and when I claim that the barn is my world, that its wooden beams are patriarchs and its bricks are the riddles through which one must break into reality,
but when I claim that my work is my presentation, that folds are sitting, that faith is compassion, and that enthusiasm is awakening,
and that we here and now are the new role models,
and that we here and now are the work,
and that I am here and there,
and you there and here,

then my claims are questioned, rejected, or authenticated beneath the linden tree. Only after this analysis of my theory and practice of perception does an individual or an audience judge:
“credible” or “not credible.”

The pre-image places the work before my claims and before your credibility, into a primal enthusiasm, an awakening before the word and before the image, into a feeling that corresponds, through a passive activity, with matter confronting us. It is not my world, but an experience from my world entering your world, it is an encounter with the other, it is dwelling within an experience. Through awareness and mindfulness, looking at an abstract painting or sitting on a hard chair is given wings, endurance becomes pausing, and resistance becomes understanding.

Carl Pfeil, 25th April 2026