Luis Maria Sulzmann’s and Jan Trinkaus first joint presentation at the BOK Gallery begins with programmatic sentences: “The last thing I saw was a red herring, now I’m stuck in limbo” - "Das letzte, was ich sah, war ein roter Hering, nun stecke ich in der Vorhölle fest." The Dadaist linguistic images are based on American idioms, where the red herring means something like a false lead. Are such leads also meant to be laid in the exhibition? Possibly... The ambiguity of the words is reflected in the works shown, which include mutual cross-references that are not always easy to decipher.
The basis of mutual artistic approach is Sulzmann's work "to be left in limbo." The almost monochrome photo panels are not primarily about motifs: structures of a skull, a blue study of a woman, historicist ornamentation of an old portal. What they all share is a mysterious aura and a lot of atmosphere. Part of Sulzmann's concept is that the large formats are mounted in carefully lined-up stainless steel modules on the wall. The artist gives insight into his process: “First, I photograph motifs digitally, view them on the computer, and then photograph them analog again. Then it goes to the darkroom, where I experiment with exposure and development times on the film negative, add certain salts, and the like, resulting in solarized photo works, intentionally incorrect.” He doesn’t reveal much more about his experimental photographic art, which combines painterly depth and texture with restrained color. Curator Emily Pretzsch sums it up: "Sulzmann's artistic practice is rooted in an interest in atmospherically charged spaces. With a keen sense of perception and observation, he tries to capture moods with the medium of photography."
Sulzmann has sparked his fellow student and former roommate Jan's interest in such works and now invited him to respond with his own perspective. Trinkaus has absorbed the large formats, creating small-format paper works in response. His delicate and meticulously executed pencil drawings initially resemble blueprints and constructions, strongly utilizing the method of shelf-like tiering and parallel shifting. He now calls his series "The Case of the Red Herring." The trails he lays for the viewer include number sequences like 1-2-3-4 or 2-4-1-3, movement studies reminiscent of dance step diagrams, drawing ideas and their derivation. Regarding his typical style of serializing graphic structures and processing, he says: “Normally I work with specific templates, which is not the case here. I navigate my systematic and orderly approach through the intuitions and processes of Sulzmann's works, also into their proportions, moods, and movements. This involves quite a bit of intellectual effort.” Somehow, what one sees here recalls the connections between philosophy, art, and information theory of great thinkers like Werner Leinfellner. Trinkaus does not know him. Even if one does not fully understand his thought systems, one can still appreciate the fine aesthetics of his visual language and discover more and more relationships between the two styles. Their encounter is nothing less than the rare art of intelligent rapprochement, which one would wish to see more often in other areas of society as well.
Reinhold Gries
