Siegfried Anzinger (b. 1953, Austrian) has held several notable national and international exhibitions, such as participation in Documenta 7 (1982) and representing the Austrian pavilion at the Biennale in Venice 1988. Anzinger was awarded the Oskar Kokoschka Prize in 1986 and the Grand Austrian State Prize for Visual Arts in 2003. His work is in the collections of the MoMA (New York City), Kolumba Museum (Cologne, DE), Belvedere (Vienna, AUS) and numerous other institutions. His influence extends to a young generation of artists as well. Due not only to his painting professorship at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf (since 1998), but because he is more of a support system than a teacher. Anzinger stands for the freedom of expression in art. Until today, he continues his search for new solutions in painting.

In the artist’s latest body of work, Birkbeck envisioned Germany, a place he’s never been. Combining polyamory and German folklore with imagined prehistoric history, both dinosaurs and lederhosen-clad hunters linger amongst dark trees. In the painting “Alpine Love,” after climbing the Alps, a group of men make love on the summit. Birkbeck has an aptitude for pulling together a wide range of references and improvising disparate connections. Discussing his thought process behind the painting, he explains, “I was imagining what it would be like in Germany. I’ve seen enough pictures to know about The Schwarzwald. I also know when the Dutch and Germans settled Africa, they called it the Wald. And Americans had a famous president with ‘velt’ in his last name, Roosevelt. Roose is roses. Maybe it means flowering forest? Something like that.” Birkbeck’s artworks follow this personalized logic with liberal doses of free association. He doesn’t censor himself, rather indulges the subconscious. The results reveal a diverse cast of historical and contemporary personas that co-exist on multiple, simultaneous timelines.

Amadeus Certa (b. 1992, German) has finished his studies of painting and graphics as an master student of Siegfried Anzinger at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. For his degree show he was awarded by the Academy with the degree´s prize in 2016. Lately in 2018 Certa was honoured with the Heinrich-Vetter-Prize for Visual Arts. Certa´s work was shown in several national and international exhibitions in Berlin, Hamburg, Düsseldorf, New York and Toronto, among them the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art in Warsaw and Port 25 Museum for Contemporary Art Mannheim.

Manshu-Rhan Park (b. 1993, German) graduated with painting and graphics as a master student of Siegfried Anzinger at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. Since then, his works have been on display regularly in Karlsruhe, Düsseldorf, and Paderborn, as well as at international art fairs. In 2020, Manshu-Rhan Park was nominated for the Kunstpreis of Sparkasse Karlsruhe.

Mariah Dekkenga (b. 1978, Marathon, Wisconsin) lives between Doha, Qatar & Randolph, VT. She has held solo and two-person exhibitions at SITUATIONS, New York; Aetopolous Gallery, Athens Greece; Eli Ping Frances Perkins, New York; and Jackie Klempay Gallery, Brooklyn. Selected group exhibitions include Clifton Benevento, New York; Suzanne Geiss, New York; The Hole, New York; Denny Gallery, New York; and The Fire Station, Doha, Qatar. She graduated from The University of Iowa with a MFA in 2008 and has since participated in residencies at the Babayan Culture House in Cappadocia, Turkey; Takt Kunstraum Tapir in Berlin; and Officina Stamperia del Notaio in Tusa, Spain. Her work is held in the collections of QMA Qatar Museums, Doha Qatar, Aïshti Foundation Collection, Beirut, Lebanon, JPMorgan Chase Art Collection, the New York Presbyterian Hospital, New York, NY, and the Collection of the US Embassy in Nogales, Mexico.

Broader color assignments lead to scribbling with a coarse stroke. They cover the picture carrier without wanting to hide a motif. Often the paint atomizes at the end of the application, which can be flat or linear. On the translucent image carrier, she then creates fine pastel nebula, star dust. Bright clouds of color explode, glitter, and shimmer like rainbow-colored aurorae. And occasionally, drops and plugs mix under the paint dust—dry dust and liquid come together. But they can also fight, then one physical state becomes main actor, displaced the other and the image background. Theissens pictures are then either transparent watercolors or painted with brittle chalk. Always in motion, the spreading ink application becomes the cross-border worker of the sensually experienced. Theissen sees his pictures as arrangements of a fleeting state, as moments of transition. Fragrances are transferred to color barts, the fragrant is given an appearance. The spray water becomes heavier, thicker, finally colorful.

Stefan Theissen (b. 1977, German) has finished his studies of painting as a master student of Tal R at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. Since then, his work was shown in several solo and group exhibitions in Berlin, Hamburg, Düsseldorf and New York, among them Museum KIT–Kunst im Tunnel, Düsseldorf and CFA, Berlin.

LaKela Brown (b. 1982, Detroit, MI) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. Brown received her B.F.A. from the College for Creative Studies in 2005. Brown has held solo exhibitions at Reyes | Finn, Detroit; Lars Friedrich, Berlin; Jackie Klempay, Brooklyn; Cave, Detroit; and 56 Henry, New York. She was included in a group show at We Buy Gold in Brooklyn in 2017. Brown’s work has been featured in Classic Beauty: 21st-Century Artists on Ancient [Greek] Form at Providence College, and Readymades Belong to Everyone: Curated by Fredi Fischli and Niels Olsen at the Swiss Institute. Brown is currently on faculty at NYU and was a 2018 resident at Ox-Bow School of Art. Her work has been reviewed in Hyperallergic, Artforum and Contemporary Art Daily.

With all the poppy colors, Schmalix' pictures have a soothing effect. Not calming alone, because the color balance would have been successful in a long negotiation process. Soothing also because the contour becomes an ornament. Here, Schmalix is not unlike his Austrian ancestors of Art Nouveau. Decoration and its objectification in ornament are manifestations of, speaking with Kant, "free beauty", in whose assessment "the taste judgment is pure". Decorativeness tends to be characterized by a weakening of the center of the image. The image content loses meaning in favor of a rhythm that captures the image as a whole. The ornament is both, essential and unnecessary. Because if I were asked what these paintings are about, I would say top and round, blue and green, red and yellow shapes.