About Artist

Kyung-hwa Choi-ahoi from Seoul, Korea, studied Fine Art at the Hamburg University of Fine Arts and is currently teaching as a professor of drawing at the Berlin Weissensee School of Art.
The “Garden” working group, which she has been dealing with since 2013, is also presented in the exhibition.
A three-month studio stay in the park of Ritzebüttel Castle in Cuxhaven focused her observations on nature and flora. Her fascination and observation of the similarity of the structure of plants and of human body parts, which she had previously acquired in her anatomical drawings, were implemented as surreal visual elements.
Since then feet, mouths, noses and ears have found their way into her plant drawings and stand next to and instead of panicles, flowers and buds.
An image of a dream picture. A visual language of a metaphor of the artist. A search for the synthesis with nature and the connection with the garden pictures.
The Greek artist Nikos Valsamakis, who studied in The Athens School of Fine Arts (ASFA) and at the University of Fine Arts Hamburg (HFBK), catapults the landscape back into the dramaturgy of colours. At first, figurative constellations determined his painting, later followed by multi-coloured parcel – like conglomerates, which are reminiscent of views of differently planted fields, bundle a sea of candles, or give the impression of autumnal leaves, so his canvases have become increasingly abstract. The space now manifests itself in the pulsating glow of colour – and this means both the lighting effect and its ability to create worlds and create depth in the surface – which is compressed and expanded in a variety of nuances and layers. The ochre tones, which prevail on the front line, so to speak, as the first image impression, make one think of the gold background of icon painting and light fields that shine from the inside out. On the edges, as the artist notes, there are still “motif remnants”, perhaps the afterimage of a stylized aureole, delicately veiled colour fields or geometric elements that detach themselves from the floating layers of the image space and at the same time frame it before it takes off completely. They are perceptual images, images that deal with seeing and expand our ability to perceive.
(written by Dr. Belinda Grace Gardner)

Kyung-hwa Choi-ahoi and Nikos Valsamakis