Volker Hueller

Nostalgia without being nostalgic»The Déja-vu experience«, writes Margit Brehm in her essay on the most recent works by the Schwontkowski student, Volker Hueller (b. 1976) »deceives the senses«. That might have something to do with the artist’s own aims, for example how one should approach the differentiation of the basic questions in painting since the beginning of the twentieth century, leading directly to the dynamic relationship between abstraction and figuration, but also to questions pertaining to the specific treatment of the painting’s surface. Volker Hueller had introduced extraneous materials into the ground of the painting from an early stage and worked them into the surface forms: foils, PVC, fake fur or imitation reptile skin are deployed conditionally as elements of the collage, but actually have veritably become one with the pictures. In this way Volker Hueller also successfully negotiates the game with the fundamental affinity between ornament and abstraction all the way to integration of the human figure into an overall composition. Roberta Smith enviously declared in »The New York Times« towards the end of 2009 that German artists today simply understand that irony and sincerity don’t have to be mutually exclusive and furthermore that »Mr Hueller, who has a delicate hand with etching and an amiable roughness with painting«, deliberately manages to avoid exaggerating this fact. Exhibition: Grimm Gallery, Amsterdam, 26/11–7/1/2012