mir ist als öffnet ein verwandter Geist mir die Arme

The Kunstverein is starting its 2024 exhibition year with a double exhibition by the painter TENKI HIRAMATSU and the sculptor PECO KAWASHIMA. Both artists come from Japan and studied at the Karlsruhe Art Academy. Tenki Hiramatsu, creates a visionary world in his paintings in which humans, animals and mythical creatures immerse themselves in the nature of light and darkness, blurring the boundaries between tragedy and comedy. Tenki Hiramatsu's fragmented "creatures" are never planned in advance, they only materialise in the painting process. They react formally to the abstract base layer of each picture and produce associative images. The figures nestle against each other, we assume they have a life of their own, a living physiognomy. At first glance, we seem to sense something all too familiar, but in the stillness of looking at them, the creatures elude categorisation, their painterly counterparts blurring into an enigmatic narrative. Alongside the indeterminate creatures, which embody their obstinacy, the "other", in the interstices of the pictorial worlds, there is a level that touches. "...a magical relationship to the world that is not characterised by representation, i.e. by imagination and meaning, but by direct contact. "* Tenki's works are an enigmatic, wordless delight. Peco Kawashima, places human existence and time at the centre of her work in her conceptual pieces. During her scholarship at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris in 2022, she created columnar installations made of paper, wax and steel. Peco's sculptures embody a powerful tactile quality that reflects the skill of an accomplished craftswoman with a wide range of skills. She is a master of the artful techniques of wood turning, metalworking and papermaking. Peco Kawashima's poetic sculptural works, which can be seen at Kunstverein Wilhelmshöhe, can be located between a you and I, between volumes and time and their harmony. Peco weaves titles, text elements and sculptures into a coherent composition. Her participatory works open up a space for the direct involvement of the other person, who moves in a secret circulation, similar to a murmur that is longingly in search of a common "language". * Friedrich Hölderlin, Hyperion, 1792 - 1792