Thomas Arnolds

RUN (Fraktale)

With RUN (fractals), Klemm’s presents Thomas Arnolds’ second solo exhibition at the gallery. On display are six of the latest works from the extensive RUN series, which Arnolds has consistently updated and reworked in ever new chapters since 2018. He expands existing chapters, reconfigures or interweaves them anew, and continues to develop his painterly cosmos, which oscillates between abstraction and figuration.

For RUN (fractals), Arnolds has created three monumental, multicolored oil paintings and three smaller, nearly monochromatic works in shades of gray, black, and olive green. The figurative pictorial vocabulary he developed in recent years that was previously contrasted with large monochromatic surfaces, is in these newest works either interwoven with abstract, multicolored, densely layered backgrounds or entirely pushed out of the picture. The smaller, self-contained works displayed on the lower floor form a kind of foundation for the large-scale formats upstairs. On their monochromatic surfaces—structured by diagonal strokes and counterstrokes—the artist has placed a completely flat white rectangle in the upper third of the image that acts as a placeholder or baseplate to mark a fixed point within the composition. From this rectangle, a relief-like “drawing” made of thickly applied oil paint, untouched by the brush, branches out in the same color, extends downward, and lends the works their titles: RUN (Root) 1–3. Here, Arnolds draws on a technique previously tested in his white paintings and bonsai works that allows for a symbolic exploration despite the restriction to a single color tone.

By contrast, in the multilayered and multicolored monumental paintings presented on the upper floor, the artist remains largely on the surface. The colorful, underlying structure extends over a large area, seemingly beyond the boundaries of the canvas. Above a dense, irregular network of green, blue, black, and a few red strokes, the bright orange, oversized feet of a reclining figure dominate much of the right-hand side of the canvas. Their size, color, and solid shape lend them a strong presence. Similarly, in RUN (H.S.) Self-Portrait, it is a hand positioned monumentally and slightly off-center that occupies center stage. Thumb, index, and middle fingers come together in a kind of double-pinch gesture. Opposable thumbs are a characterizing feature of all Old World primates, including Homo sapiens, and provide humans, in particular, exceptional dexterity when handling tools. The complex anatomy of these body parts has made them challenging objects of study for both scientists and Renaissance painters such as Albrecht Dürer and Leonardo da Vinci. Yet, Thomas Arnolds is not aiming for a lifelike depiction but rather a typified monumental form structured by blue or black internal lines that are separated from the background by a surrounding contour. The slit on the palm of the hand indicates that it could also be just a mere cover. Upon closer inspection, the columnar elements of base, shaft, and capital that characterize Arnolds’ RUN series filter through only as fragments here and there from the colored substructure of both horizontal formats.

Has the human body, a representative motif of it, or even human life itself taken precedence over architecture and tectonics? It is up to the viewer to pursue these ideas further, and the artist does not deny his interest in these deeply human themes, expressive forms, cultural techniques, or spirituality. Above all, the pictorial elements and artistic techniques used here serve him as an opportunity to deal with the fundamental questions of painting. He seeks to explore the limits and possibilities of abstraction and figuration, figure and ground, painting and graphic art, architecture and nature, as well as to establish a steadfast position for himself in the classical debate between the arts and the history of painting.

In the third large-format painting, RUN (B.B. figural) 1, Thomas Arnolds dispenses entirely with human body fragments. The image surface is almost completely covered by a multicolored, dense, linear structure that converges in the center, suggesting a diagonal, ascending composition while becoming slightly more transparent toward the edges. Upon closer viewing, linear elements and fragments of the columnar motifs can be found in the basic structure; in terms of color, the vibrant red and clear blue brushstrokes are particularly striking. Thus, the colors and pictorial composition evoke associative or even emotional references to the large, multi-figure altarpieces depicting The Assumption of Mary from the Renaissance and early Baroque periods.

With these numerous internal references within his own work, as well as references to themes and imagery from the history of art and painting, Thomas Arnolds succeeds in consistently developing his work further, always focusing on different aspects, using them to conceive new images, and, like a fractal structure, penetrating deeper into pictorial worlds. An analogy can be made to fractal geometry, which deals with complex structures and phenomena that occur similarly in nature and are characterized by self-similarity—each small part of an object reflects the structure of the whole. Examples can be found in nature in the structure of a fern leaf or the branching of blood vessels. With RUN (fractals),  Thomas Arnolds thus finds an extremely apt terminology for his systematic approach, one that posits the artist’s actions as a quasi-natural, mathematically grounded principle that diminishes the role of individual personality and genius. In this way, it is possible to systematize not only the works in this exhibition but indeed his entire oeuvre in a highly coherent manner—despite its uniqueness and diversity in technique, aesthetics, and appearance.

Friederike Schuler