0034

Hermann Nitsch’s painting is “deeply rooted in Actionism and performance”. He himself described it as “the origin of action performances and at the same time their result” (Silvie Aigner, in: Parnass, issue 2/2022, Vienna 2022, p. 27).

Wild splashes of red paint cover large parts of the picture surface, including delicate squirts of dried blood. At the top, where the layers of paint overlap and become opaque, we see traces of excessive treatment using broad brushes, palms or fingers. The dominant pictorial element, however, is the paint splashed in all directions, which determines the composition in its vehemence and movement. Hermann Nitsch described the process of pouring paint on the canvas as the “visual grammar of action theatre on a picture surface” (Hermann Nitsch, at: https://www.nitsch.org/malaktionen/ accessed 7.10.2023).

According to the artist, it is only through the informal that “the human being has become mature enough to consciously assimilate a part of the sensual, which was previously only registered on a subconscious level, but which was able to be evoked by association, through dream, memory, poetry and myth” (Hermann Nitsch, at: see above). The viewers embark on a journey on which they at first grasp the dynamics of the process of creation through form. However, the longer they engage in this contemplation, the more intense and sensual the evoked sensations become, until finally the painter’s excitement is transferred to the viewer. In this way, “an elementary sensual feeling is harnessed for the purpose of art” (Hermann Nitsch, at: see above) and automatically brings with it an expansion of consciousness. Emotions are transferable, they can pass directly from the artist to each of us via the canvas, sensually stimulating processes and repressed areas are made visible in a dramatic way. Hermann Nitsch is interested in staging a “real occurrence” (Hermann Nitsch, at: see above).

(Sophie Cieslar)