Werner Friedrichs
Werner Friedrichs (born December 2, 1936 in Detmold ) is a contemporary German painter and graphic artist. His work includes pencil and pen drawing, pastel, watercolor, oil painting, etching and stone printing. He works in a figurative manner.
Life
After graduating from high school in Detmold in 1956, Werner Friedrichs studied painting and graphics at the universities of fine arts in Hamburg and Berlin from 1956 to 1960. Parallel to commissioned work in the graphic field, he developed his drawing and painting style. The first exhibition in the Altschwager Gallery in Hamburg in 1974 was followed by solo and group exhibitions throughout Germany.
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Werner Friedrichs has developed his own visual language. “In his compositions he usually places various figural motifs in a form of communication with one another that can contain all facets from intense to disturbing. People and animals, preferably birds, appear with different intentions. They appear alienated, mask-like, typified or even sculptural, as if frozen. The often distorted perspective of motif and background contributes significantly to the impression of alienation. In addition to the not always immediately recognizable desire for alienation, these works, created in a painting style reminiscent of the old masters, often contain moments of surprise, which Friedrichs always knows how to accentuate with a humorous note. " (Susanne Geese, art historian, viakultura)
A look at the work of Werner Friedrichs shows: “All techniques and materials are at hand. From the fleeting sketch, capturing observations of everyday life, the meticulously executed pencil or pen drawing, from watercolor and tempera to the graphic prints to the color-graded oil pieces on canvas, he spreads his worldview. A world view that reveals far-sightedness and deep-sightedness. Surreal, on the surface, this could be a drawer for his work. If so, then he should be viewed more as a realist, says Friedrichs. Its technology is committed to the real. (...) “The titles Werner Friedrichs gives his pictures release associations - just as his works often arise from the associated. Impressions, inner images, stored for a long time, break out. It is not uncommon for the archetypal to seek expression from mankind's long-term memory. Secret allusions, nuances, echoes, as they appear in abundance, become eerie. Eerie like the recurring motif of the eyeless, invisible glasses, the shiny spherical heads, the elements of fauna and flora that are symbolically integrated into the human.
(Herbert Glossner, freelance cultural journalist)
The art historian Peter Dering calls Werner Friedrichs a puzzling storyteller. Pathos is not his thing. Neither did partisanship. But what happens in his paintings, what is played there, is certainly typical of the time and could not have been seen and painted in this way in other epochs. (...) If you look at Friedrich's work as a whole, you notice, extremely surprised, that there are no repetitions. It is very rare that there are comparable details in the image structure, otherwise each image is completely redesigned. Not only in terms of content, but also in terms of composition. Always a new beginning. Overarching similarities can be found on the stylistic level. One will always recognize a picture of Friedrichs under this aspect. In its color relationships, in the clearly separated spatial levels, in the lines. But also in the artificiality of the painted scenes. In their coolness, in which there were no diffuse veils of color. In terms of content, however, the clarity of the situations is only apparent. Again and again we see precisely constructed, but in the statement very indefinite, ambiguous arrangements in which there is nothing incidental.
Stone printing / lithography
All lithographs were created during various work stays between 1985 and 1999 in the artist workshop Kätelhön Druckgrafik am Möhnesee.
Solo exhibitions
- 1974: Altschwager Gallery, Hamburg
- 1974: Gallery in the Zimmertheater, Münster
- 1976: Lippische Gesellschaft für Kunst e. V., Detmold
- 1977: Norderstedter Kunstverein e. V., Norderstedt
- 1977: Galerie Alfermann, Solingen
- 1978: Galerie Pariser Strasse, Berlin
- 1979: Marsyas Gallery, Munich
- 1979: Galerie Rolandshof, Remagen-Rolandseck
- 1980: Galerie Alfermann, Solingen
- 1981: Galerie Rolandshof, Remagen-Rolandseck
- 1981: Galerie Strompen, Berlin
- 1983: Galerie Rolandshof, Remagen-Rolandseck
- 1983: Gallery Association Blankenese, Hamburg
- 1984: Galerie Alfermann, Solingen
- 1984: German General Sunday Gazette, Hamburg
- 1986: Galerie Rolandshof, Remagen-Rolandseck
- 1986: Gallery Bollhagen, Worpswede
- 1988: Kunstverein Oerlinghausen
- 1988: Galerie Preuss, Hamburg
- 1993: Galerie Walter Ehrler, Frankfurt / M.
- 1995: Galerie Walter Ehrler, Frankfurt / M.
- 1996: Amsa Gallery, Hamburg
- 1999: European Cultural Center / Gallery Villa Rolandseck, Remagen-Rolandseck
- 2003: Galerie Walter Ehrler, Frankfurt / M.
literature
- The general dictionary of artists (AKL), publisher: Verlag KG Saur,
- H. Ebert: Lex der Bildenden u. creative artist,
- Flemig, caricaturist lexicon,
- H. Klein: Catalog of the art collection of the German. Bundestag,
- Beltz & Gelberg,
- Cornelsen-Hirschgraben,
- DA Sunday paper,
- Reutlingen prints,
- Journalist - the German media magazine,
- Catalog of works of art in the KS of the German Bundestag,
- Catalog artists in Hamburg,
- Lexicon of visual and creative artists in Westphalia-Lippe,
- Lippe State Library, Grabbe Archive.
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Friedrichs, Werner |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German painter and graphic artist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 2, 1936 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Detmold |