Untitled (2) cadmium red

For Axel Koschier, painting is a method for approaching the world’s absurdities, and a way of putting processes and relations into two-dimensional form. A key aspect of his work is the way it comments, in nonchalant style, on art’s forms of inscription, its modes of representation, and its attributions of meaning.

Koschier has made five unique pieces exclusively for Kunstverein Bielefeld’s 2021/22 annual editions. Using painterly methods, the works interpret the serial format, based in the first instance on color schemes developed by the Japanese artist Sanzo Wada in 1933 and 1934. Here, Koschier uses layers of muslin with pigmented watercolors, with each layer of paint leaving an imprint and in turn forming a template for those which follow. When a number of the muslin surfaces are placed on top of one another, the watercolors blend, creating a series which gradates in color. Koschier’s motifs refer back to a form taken from everyday life; the composition is based formally on the underside of fruit boxes, exhibiting the tension produced when a concrete object is transformed into a two-dimensional abstraction.