Exhibition Catalogue published by Galerie Peter Kilchmann

Andy Denzler/Spectral Paintings | The origins of the Spectral Paintings lay in a time period of quiet but intensive introspection for the artist. In the past two years, Denzler spent much of his time in isolation in his studio in Zurich. Due to the surroundings circumstances, themes like fleeting personal bonds and the transienceof our life and its components started to be at the forefront of the artist's mind. Denzler's Spectral Paintings symbolizes both a personal consideration about the passage of time, what stays behind, and a painter's sovereign ability to provide spaces for projection. It is an invitation to engage in an open dialogue with his work and give the viewer the opportunity to discover a deeper meaning on a more personal level.

Text by Thomas Ruettiman

Monograph published by Damiani

Andy Denzler, Fragmented Identity | The elusive imagery in Andy Denzler’s paintings is not so much the product of what is there, but what is not there. Denzler has developed a signature technique that injects his paintings with an instant subtext, a now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t narrative. “I am not interested in painting pretty pictures. I try to create a certain mood or ambience. It has a lot to do with color and lighting. It should look dark rather than nice,” he says. Hence men and women who appear pinned to the wall by an unseen centrifugal force; women sitting uneasily on the edges of chairs or on unmade beds; a man and a woman in a decomposing villa.

Phoebe Hoban is an american journalist and author of Basquiat, A Quick Killing in Art and Lucian Freud: Eyes Wide Open.

Monograph published by Hatje Cantz

Andy Denzler/Paintings The Human Nature Project | The title Mythenquai I (Death of Actaeon) (p. 35) alludes to an episode from Ovid’s Metamorphoses in which the hunter Actaeon observes the Goddess Diana while she is bathing, is transformed by her into a stag for this offence, and is subsequently killed by his hounds. In its dramatic pictorial sensibility and painterly treatment, Denzler’s painting might be compared to Titian’s Death of Actaeon: both artists model the subjects of their images not based on contour but on the paint, Titian classically with the brush, Denzler through smudging with the squeegee. The broken coloring in Denzler’s rendering is reminiscent of the Venetian master as well. Differences become clear above all in the handling of the literary source material: while Titian conclusively interprets Actaeon’s fate, Denzler’s painting formulates conundrums that do not allow the action depicted and the literary convention referred to in the title to be reconciled unambiguously. Denzler’s recourse to Ovid’s poem and Titian’s painting seem to be important insofar as he takesup the ideas of transformation and relates it to how such traditions are handled in general.