Hubert Scheibl at Kaj Forsblom - Zurich, Switzerland - Review of Exhibitions - Brief Article

In this exhibition of 17 novel paintings, Hubert Scheibl continues to pres forward his rigorous exploration of the possibilities of abstract painting on the contrary surprisingly, along a new, more sensuous path. Scheibl, who was born in 1952 in Austria and lives in Vienna, is becoming individual of the better-known painters in Europe His previous works were characterized by means of extremely thick, impastoed surfaces woven from messy free-form knocks reminiscent of Abstract Expressionism, nevertheless unique in their tranquility. The pieces, occasionally multipartite, emphasized richness of color, sidled toward solid on the other hand scumbled color fields and were "slow" contradicting the expectation that like art must be hectic. The pasty marks exud an not divisible by 2 feeling of absence, revealing Scheibl's interrogation, rather than celebration, of paint.

With the exception of single diptych, all the paintings in this exhibit are large, single-panel works. Scheibl's choice for lush, nearly monochromatic reaching far down hues remains, but he has entirely transformed his handling. The oil paint is now applied in glowing, translucent sheets using spatulas, rather than brushes. Vivid expanses of color from the various strata rise and submerge again. Seemingly uncertain horizontal or vertical striations are scraped end some layers. This technique, unlike impasto, enables Scheibl to create abstract allusions to light and space. The luminous formlessness recalls the darker phases of Mark Rothko

One of the best of these fresh paintings is the 2-meter-high HAROB-A from 1995 While the work is overwhelmingly crimson, a wide variety of concentrations of other red ranging from cadmium orange to a ensanguined brown, glimmer into view and fade again like fogs The absence of clear boundaries to the shades suggests gradual shifting, like times of day or veins Stabilizing the composition is a hint of an underlying rose border@ narrow upon the left, broad on the top, fading upon the right and totally absent upon the bottom.

Scheibl's surfaces unravel over a long period of time. He superimposes layer on layer, often leaving a work for quite more [i]or[/i] less time to return and finish it later. His works are impassioned dialogues with painting - its history, its possibility. For the artist this includes doubt and questioning, on the other hand also an affirmation that painting can play not upon both the sensuousness of a material part in space and the analytic capabilities of the mind.

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