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Two people, tired but of good temper. Another domino in Vienna.
 Philipp and Julia, partners in crime, had worked the night before at Mondscheinbazar, a late night flee market . For their label “Fuxherz” they print bags and shirts with individual animal motives penned by Philipp.
He studies art and is mostly dedicated to drawing. “Even if I paint with oil, it’s drawing somehow.”
I get what he means. The paintings and drawings I’ve seen so far are more or less figurative, showing animals or people.
And there is a strong connection with written words or phrases.
I look through some books that Philipp bought somewhere, old used ones. He picked some phrases on every page and used them as inspiration for illustrations. The range of techniques and motives is wide, but most of the times he used ink.
I discover figures and faces, bodies and gestures, sometimes in transparent light water color manner, sometimes thick and colorful acrylic paint. Sometimes clear and strict, sometimes diffuse and expressive. Something lies within that makes them belong together. Maybe it’s the palette of colors or the well-considered use of lines, surface and composition.
“I always simply start somehow”
As soon as I showed Philipp the draft of the graphic designer I met before (Dan Bartensen), he started setting up. Suddenly a bunch of ink bottles in all colors, water-color and acrylic paint were put on the desk.
Philipp started drawing right away with ink and feather.
I asked him about his association. “I always simply start somehow” he responded. The word “Lebenselexir” had reminded him of “Ursuppe”, the primordial liquid all life came from. (Primordial soup)
I like the idea of turning something refreshing and reanimating like an elixir into a rather dirty, old, mysterious goo. Both there to give life, one to give energy and youth and the other: the spooky result of natures experiment, some billion years old, with slimy creatures creeping out of it, like worms and amphibians.
In surprisingly short time Philipp created a mingle-mangle of animals, lines and colors, winding around each other. On the bottom a quite optimistic looking bird.
“There are some things words can not describe properly and there some things paint alone cannot express.”
In the end he adds the phrase “What we’re made of and what we live from.”
”I always have to write something” he apologized. I asked him why he would do it if he didn’t feel completely comfortable with it. ”There are some things words can not describe properly and there some things paint alone cannot express.” Does that mean he feels a lack of meaning in the work? I have to think back of what Alice Evermore from Berlin said. That the words were her colors and that she gave an idea to a random piece of painting. She used them as ideas and Erwin used them as pictures. Maybe for some artists they are not only additional meaning, but expanding, connecting.
To me Philipps works are not random, they are concrete and can speak for themselves.
Whether on a canvas or on a shirt.
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