Thomas Zipp: Hier (Futuristic Mess)

Religion, ritual, myth, cosmos – these are the profound themes plumbed by this Berlin artist in his paintings, sculptures, collages and drawings. A bell cast in bronze disturbs our familiar notion of this motif through the image of a human skull and the caption "Geist ohne Körper" ("Mind Without Body"). Here it is death that is being "rung in" and at the same time transformed. In a similar vein, "Mind Over Matter" ("Geist über Materie") was the title of one of his more recent exhibitions. Zipp utilizes imagery from the worlds of politics, history and science in his works. Atomic bombs and halos signify energy processes that penetrate far beyond what the eye can see or the mind can imagine. Trees and people are surrounded by mysterious patterns of lines. Veit Loers, exhibition curator and former museum director, used the term "narrative conceptualism" to describe Zipp's pictorial language. Thomas Zipp's gloomy and enigmatic yet fascinatingly sensuous scenarios never fail to cast their spell on the viewer. In the forthcoming exhibition at the Rüdiger Schöttle Gallery in December 2006, Thomas Zipp will be exploring, among other things, the seasonal theme of the Christmas Tree.