Stephanie Laeger and Henning Eichinger confront existentialism through artwork

Existentialism has always been a key inspiration for the expression of art. Today, this philosophical inquiry has lost nothing of its relevance and artists Stephanie Laeger and Henning Eichinger explore the intricacies of modern existentialism through opposing approaches in their artwork. An exhibition, featuring their works together, is being held at the art gallery Georg-Scholz-Haus in Waldkirch, Germany.

Professor Henning Eichinger reacts to cultural, social, and scientific challenges

Henning Eichinger, a professor at Reutlingen University since 1997, has always had a penchant to blur the lines between art, science, and technology. He has been exploring the intuitive and emotional facets of technological and scientific innovations and in his artwork being exhibited currently, he has focused on the challenge of the digital age. The artist tried to offer visitors the possibility to adopt a distanced-creative approach to his work created marvellously through the use of contrasting colours and connecting abstract and figurative forms.

By blending social, cultural, and scientific phenomena with art, and analyzing the art historian Karin Rase in an essay, Henning Eichinger wanted viewers to look at their own existence with distance.

As he puts it himself “…I’m concerned with different systems in which we move at the same time. Nature, family, work, business, social networks, etc. In our attempts to reconcile these systems, to synchronize them so to speak, we reach our limits. We fail, despair and hope again. My pictures are panels of these inextricable links of our world from my point of view.”

One of his works entitled “Accumulation of Small Excessive Demands” reflects the tremendous complexity of the modern world. He explains that we are constantly pressurized to focus on a plethora of things simultaneously, subsequently becoming restless and nervous, and forsaking the desired.

Stephanie Laeger plays with the human psyche

Stephanie Laeger, on her side, explores the multiple facets of the human being through her artwork. Obsessed with the essence of the human being, she has been painting faces over and over again. Famous for her ink paintings, here again, she uses this technique to deliberately reduce colours and blending in charcoal, chalk, or acrylic paints to give a unique complex dimension to the faces. She heightens the textures by wiping, rubbing, pasting, sanding and even cutting apart.

In this manner, the artist seeks to present the very own beauty of the person while creating a detachment from the real image. Working through multiple techniques on the same piece of artwork, Stephanie Laeger creates some sort of permeability, allowing viewers to look behind the facade. In this game of closeness and distance, viewers can easily become onlookers.

Having been a student of Elke Hopfe, Stephanie Laeger translates the master’s tradition persisting in exploring psychological depths. She plays with various existential questions that arise in this age of digital revolution: the pressure of social networks, burn-out due to excessive work, personal multitasking, and self-inflicted immaturity and dependencies.

h/t: Badische Zeitung
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