First IOTS Exhibition!

In general I would say that I am an impatient person, but this time things happened faster than I expected.  I hadn't even started contemplating the possibility of publicly showing my "Images Of The Subconscious" when in November I was asked by artist-friend Petronilla Hohenwarter and her partner Nigel Stonham whether I was interested in having some of my pictures displayed as part of an exhibition called "PLAYGROUND 7" at "artspace 191" in Vienna.  

I immediately agreed.

One day before the start of the exhibition Wolfgang, an old friend of mine who writes for Austrian newspaper "Die Presse" asked me per SMS to "see page 31" of their Saturday edition.  When he sends me such a message my initial guess is that he wants to draw my attention to an article he wrote or an interview he gave, e.g. about the 1982 Falkland war, or about the hopelessly tasteless "Fete Blanche" in the South of Austria where everyone is supposed to be dressed entirely in white and where one could only imagine what the reaction of a guest would be like if his or her clothes were stained e.g. with drops of Styrian pumpkin seed oil (admittedly I share Wolfgang's doubts about this ultra-posh event).  "D'accord" I replied and went to buy the newspaper.

 

When I finally got the "Presse" and opened it on page 31, I had to rub my eyes in disbelief, for what Wolfgang had written about was the exhibition at "artspace 191" - as always in his own unique style and featuring "Triple Word Score", one of my "images of the subconcious" which blends a portrait of his son Max with an old Scrabble board.

 

 

The exhibition of my work alongside those of six other artists went very well, people seemed to like the exhibits, asked about my technique and gave me very interesting and highly creative interpretations of what they were seeing in those images. 

At artspace 191, Nina managed to take an almost surrealistic picture of a man looking at the exhibits while his head appears to get sucked in by the wall.

Here Nina is having a chat with poet Hannes Kirschbaum, a good friend of ours.

Nina took this picture of me just before we were leaving the exhibition.  I guess the satisfaction I felt was written in my face  :-)  

I would like to take this opportunity to express my thanks to everyone - especially my friends - who took their time to pay a visit to artspace 191 between December 16 and 18, to Petronilla and Nigel for giving me this extraordinary opportunity, and last but not least to Nina, for being such a wonderful wife and, well... "manager"! 

Sending out season's greetings to everyone!