Mining the World for Signs
A Kaleidoscope of Colors, Abstract Shapes and Symbols
Even if we can occasionally discern ladders, houses, or leaves in some of Marianne Gielen’s work, the real world outside painting only appears in her vividly hued landscapes in form of fragmentary ciphers. Her works, many of which are characterized by an abundance of short lines rapidly and intuitively applied to the paper or canvas, contrasting colors, and the collage-like incorporation of photographs and scraps of paper, develop a life of their own and never aim to merely illustrate reality. With their wealth of details and jauntily juxtaposed elements, their whimsical flourishes and graphic notations, her works have a playfulness all their own and are eloquent testimony to the freedom of artistic composition opened up by the liberation of art from specific subject matter.
The fact that Gielen received her formal training as an artist in the 1980s may partly explain her largely non-representational approach, which is guided primarily by the dynamic of lines and colors. At the time when she attended the University of the Arts in Berlin, artists like Walter Stöhrer and Per Kirkeby exerted a profound influence on many students. They left an impression on Gielen, as well, and we can detect echoes of Stöhrer’s dynamic brushstrokes and Kirkeby’s intensely glowing dark colors in her works. Her use of symbols and signs reflects her keen interest in the philosopher and theorist Roland Barthes, who analyzed the connotations and dimensions of meanings conveyed by signs beyond what they literally denote.
In forgoing illusionist representation in favor of abstraction and by concentrating on the techniques of painting and pursuing reduction as rigorously as she does, Gielen distills the essence of the subjects she conveys and gives expression to the intuitive structures that possibly underlie reality. She usually works on paper, a material which suits her own personal style and, due to its insubstantial character, lends itself particularly well to the ephemeral nature of her preferred subjects and to capturing the elusive quality of smells and sounds on a two-dimensional surface.
For all the consistency and stylistic distinctiveness of her work, Gielen has always remained open to all sorts of new rhythms and influences. Thus her oeuvre reflects the wealth of impressions and experience she gained on travels in various countries (e.g. Russia, Poland, and Mali) and on extended periods spent on artist’s residencies in other cities in Germany (i.e. Cuxhaven) and abroad (e.g. Virginia, Turkey, and Japan). They have served as a rich source of inspiration for her imagery, and many of the signs and signets she incorporates can be interpreted as references to the sensory impressions she received in the various places she has visited and worked in.
However, although the influence of the different cultures, mystical signs, symbols and structures Gielen has encountered on her travels is evident in the numerals, ladders, crisscrossing lines, and patterns we find in her works, they contain no references to the sign systems of any specific cultures or religions. Gielen does not illustrate; she aims to convey the rhythm, moods and energy of the different places where she works – and thus her largely abstract works actually do refer to specific locations, albeit obliquely.
Thus a number of drawings Gielen produced during her time as artist-in-residence at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts in 2001 touch on themes relating to the U.S. and its history. Works like Civil War I and Civil War II incorporate clear references to the subject indicated by their titles – e.g. the word “Lee”, as in General Robert E. Lee, commander of the Confederate troops – although they are anything but descriptive representations of it.
Similarly, rather than explicit depictions of indigenous huts in the savannah, the drawings in the two-part series Initiationsfest in Songo feature roughly sketched pictograms against a blood-red background that at most suggest dwellings. In these and other works from Gielen’s time in Mali, like Schakale and andere Spuren bei Koumaira, the atmosphere and energy of the place they were produced find expression in delicate webs of nervous lines in which brambles and thorns appear to have become caught.
In one work in Gielen’s Delhi series, red paint drips and runs over surfaces incorporating scraps of paper (on which we can make out adorned elephants and the words “the book shop”, among other things) that appear to derive from some sort of packaging material. Other works dating to her time in India almost seem to throb with dense jumbles of frenziedly scribbled lines, creating a feverish feeling that presumably reflects the heat and bustling life on India’s streets. Yet others, like one of the oil paintings from the Ashram series, convey a more tranquil mood, with a vibrant, almost pulsating red that appears to be slowly spreading over a dark, placid surface.
While many of Gielen’s earlier drawings and paintings are infused with the flavor of specific locations, this aspect is less prominent in the more recent works she has done in Potsdam. Thus we may surmise that the photographs of leaves and photocopies of trees incorporated into some of them depict the local flora of Potsdam and its environs, but we can only guess. Her current work is defined by the boldness of her experimental approach to paint as a material and her free use of drawing as an element rather than by any connection to a certain place.
One thing that sets Gielen apart from many of her fellow artists is that she does not limit herself in terms of the repertoire of forms and colors she draws on. In one painting she boldly splashes bright red on reticent, pale green; in another she weaves a web of agitated lines over a surface where the bare canvas shows through in spots, creating vibrant works in which various layers of superimposed, dynamic brushstrokes and teeming signs transport a wealth of different moods. Thus the unmistakable affinity of Gielen’s work with that of Paul Klee goes deeper than the occasional formal resemblances one discerns here and there, like a shape recalling a prickly pink cactus, or jittery lines crossing trees and leaves: I have a feeling that if Klee were alive today, he would recognize Marianne Gielen as a kindred spirit.