Exhibitions

One Of A Kind Art - Each Line One Breath / Contour Drawing - Aluminium sheet, permanent fineliner on high end paper.
By Artist John Franzen. John Franzen was born in Aachen, Germany. He attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Maastricht, Netherlands 2002-2007, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. Working in various disciplines and materials, he focuses on the theme and production of complex frames of concepts with the focus of the inherent primordiality.
John explains his work by saying, “This work titles a collection of freehand drawings, which focuses on an artistic and graphic interpretation of evolution through the use of simple drawn lines. The collection starts from the premise that the initiation of any drawing, its fundamental prerequisite – a line – coincides with the most basic and transcendental state of life, the perception of breathing. In extent, I abstain from any kind of redundant artistic strategies such as figuration or the social, political, economic or cultural meaning within the work. By only focusing on a scientific framework and context, I aspire to reach that very bottom of essentiality I am looking for. Starting with a straight line, I draw each following sequence by copying the character of the previous. I concentrate on breathing and focus on drawing the successor. Again and once more. Again and again.” The subject is not WHAT I create, but more THAT I create." "In the best case... and for this reason I draw ... it's as if the universe vibrates on my skin and wakes up a powerful emotion inside my gut and heart. It's like I'm listening to the inaudible sound of the energy in the universe which flows around and through me . This triggers a feeling of conjunction with incomparable originality. I disappear completely as a person or thing and I merge completely this bare energy to merge with the whole being." "... When I draw, I draw the void. Not the line. I focus on the nothingness around the line. It is a sort of meditation. My mind is clear. My focus is on the mere moment. There is only this one moment. Every time the same moment. Everything else is still. Never thoughts are louder and feelings profounder than in this moment. My mind transcends into bare presence. Personality becomes formless and nameless. With each breath the emptiness is filled more and more. With every line I get closer to my real origin…" Conceptual description: "Each line one breath" titles a limited edition of 50 freehand drawings, which focuses on an artistic and graphic interpretation of evolution through the use of simple drawn lines. The edition starts from the premise that the initiation of any drawing, its fundamental prerequisite - a line - coincides with the most basic and transcendental state of life, the perception of breathing. In extent, I abstain from any kind of redundant artistic strategies such as figuration or the social, political, economic or cultural meaning within the work. By only focusing on a scientific framework and context, I aspire to reach that very bottom of essentiality I am looking for. Starting with a straight line, I draw each following sequence by copying the character of the previous. I concentrate on breathing and focus on drawing the successor. Again and once more. Again and again. In the process of drawing, my lines evolve into a kind of logarithmic pattern and layering, steered merely by aberrances and anomalies of human failure in contrast to the precision of a machine. The resulting artworks are reminiscent of a wave-motion-pattern transporting energy through space-time, such as any electromagnetic wave, or the pattern of a DNA-replication. Lines and layers are like a primordial code or anatomic pattern assembling, arranging and composing the manifestation of energy and matter. Lines are everywhere to find. In waves of sound and light, in water and dunes, growth rings and lines of trees, skin and stratum, tree formations in the forest, the falling rain, the grass luffing in the wind. The consecutive synthesis of lines bedded next to each other depicts an allegory to the stratification of constant transmission and fusion of matter. Any kind of an existence to me is the materialized conclusion of these very basic forces.