Texts on my work
Artist Statement
I work with portraiture. Sculptures in clay based on various themes.
I have worked on series of portraits having their starting point in notions —historical notions— about the relationship between outer appearance and inner self: in the series on Physiognomy and on the Four Temperaments, theories that seek to categorize and characterize humans based on their physical features.
In recent years I have embarked on a new body of work that specifically deals with the victims of these and other taxonomies.
I have completed a series of works on people arrested by the Gestapo in Vienna during the Second World War on "suspicion of refusal to work" or "illegal relations". These Polish and Russian immigrants found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Portraying these people, I investigate our attitudes towards the Other. The Other as stranger, friend or enemy, competitor or unwanted guest.
In my series on eugenics, I have probed the archives of the Swedish Institute for Racial Biology. Between 1921 and 1958 hundreds of thousands of people were photographed, measured, described and categorized according to "race". As late as the 1960's, people were still forcibly sterilized in Sweden for being "below par".
The aim of these portraits is to come as close as possible to the person I depict. I try imagining his or her life. But source material is often limited to a photo or two, and at best a brief description. In my work the context and sensitivity of a portrait speaks for the portrayed person. Accompanied by a descriptive title from the source material, if available.
I understate rather than shout out loud. I animate my sculptures by swabbing them with watercolor.
My work is about victims, some of whom were outsiders. In one way or another I feel connected to their fate, even though my fate might be far from theirs. There is a sense of exclusion, of being different, of being an observer rather then a participant, which forms an emotional layer in my work. And there is a fear of physical or psychological violence.
In my new body of works, "French Children of the Holocaust", I portray Jewish children who were transported by the Nazis to Auschwitz. Only a few returned. For me this work has become crucial, since I have children myself. In spite of my horror and incomprehension, I try to fathom the fate of these children.
I want the people I portray to be seen again; I want to restore their dignity. I want their history to be evaluated by the audience. This body of work takes a stand against rising xenophobia.
Recently I have started drawing again. Large abstract charcoal drawings on paper. The emotional layers in my work are embodied here and almost made tangible.
Artist Statement < 2010
I am interested in portraiture in the broadest sense of the word. I am fascinated by thoughts and theories about character and personality and how people through time have tried to read and interpret the faces of other people.
In recent years I have been working on series of portrait, character and figure studies based on drawings by other artists. I am particularly interested in the artists' perceptions of people and the images created from these perceptions. What was it these artists saw that allowed them to make this work of art? How is it to look through the eyes of an artist; how is it to be an artist? By using the work of other artists I have defined and redefined my own approach of making art.
By using this approach I do not intend to copy the work of other artists, but to interpret it and make it my own. I am seeking tension between my work, the new piece I make and the work of art that I am working from. The works I make are independent, but they refer to the other works of art. They are unbound and bound simultaneously. For me they are orientation, reference and a challenge at the same time.
In my latest works I open up this approach more and more. Themes which used to be subthemes in earlier series, like variations in expression or the expression of strong emotions, get more space in this new body of work.
My starting point is no longer studying the works of one artist at the time in a series of works, but the exploration of a theme for example, the expression of strong emotion. I am using images from different sources, picking and sampling freely from gestures and expressions within the theme, collecting and investigating combinations to make a new work of art. This way of working is somewhat more intuitive than the previousmethod. I am moving towards finding out new facets of my long term investigation of my own motivations and preoccupations as an artist.
In recent years I have worked on several series:
• Albrecht Dürer, who was very interested in human proportions and made many studies on this subject. These drawings are collected in the 'Dresden Sketchbook' of 1528.
• J.H. Lips was an artist who worked in commission for J.C.Lavater, an 18th century Swiss doctor who wrote a book on Physiognomy, that became famous during that period. Physiognomy is the "art" of reading faces.
• The Fayoum series are based on ancient portraits painted in wax which were found in the Egyptian oasis of Fayoum. These are the first known 'real' portraits.
• The Self-portrait series: with the help of selfportraits by the Dutch contemporary artist Philip Akkerman and Austrian artist Egon Schiele, I have studied the different styles and approaches these artists use in there work.
• The Physiognomy series, based upon pictures in a book on physiognomy 'Geheimniss der Menschenform' (The secrets of the human form) by the German authors Bürger and Nöttling, 1958.
These authors believe that the face is the mirror of the soul; they also believe in their own infallabillity. Without reflection on this starting point the authors make statements such as: "a thin upperlip shows a harsh and strong nature".
The authors believe in their own clairvoyant ability to read faces and illustrate this fascinating book with hundreds of pictures of ordinairy and less ordinary people.
To me this series is about prejudice. I used the pictures from this book and sculpted the people as vividly as possible: ordinary people you meet every day in the streets. The texts from the book I place under the work without any comment.
Through the ages people have tried to reveal and understand the character and intents of other people. Theories from these attempts have been linked to facial features and have been catagorized and interpreted to know the other, or to improve, understand or predict the other.
A number of people have played a role in the making of these theories.
Aristotle compared humans with animals. You are brave as a lion or scared as a chicken. The seventeenth - century artist Charles le Brun made some wonderful and astonishing drawing on this subject.
The Swiss theologian J.C. Lavater wrote a book on physiognomy, the art of reading faces. (Essays on Physiognomy: Designed To Promote The Knowledge And The Love Of Mankind, 1789) He stated for exemple that a high forehead implied high intelligence and a powerful nose a powerful will. Lavater thought that you could improve people once you could read their faces. J.H. Lips was the artist who illustrated this book with many illustrations.
Joseph Gall (1758-1828) had a quite innocent theory, phrenology, in which the skull is divided into specified areas which would represent the mental faculties of the brain.
Cesare Lombroso brought to the late nineteenth century his theories of the relation between the features of the face and criminal psychopathology. With his criminal profiles he thought one could recognize a criminal for his elaborate eyebrows or his heavy jaw.
Within these theories there are interesting and horrifying links with ideas about race and gender at the start of the twentieth century and the cruelties performed by Nazi Germany.
In my work I contemplate on these ideas and theories, in the sense that I offer a critical reflection on the thoughts about character and identity.
Gert Germeraad | info@gertgermeraad.eu | +46 414 911 98
