Rendering Infinity

The timeless thrust of Leger’s statement is reflected in Sabine Boehl’s fragile works. One might be tempted to speak of images but these pieces, with their bead applica- tions and blank sections are beyond the conventional conceptual world of the image. And this is intended. We can therefore speak of a free space, which, like a cut in a Fontana image exposes ‘terra incognita’, an unknown zone in the zone dividing image from object. It is this zone that keeps all the freedoms at hand and the option open to move with recourse to the past and the wealth of what cultures offer. Without a doubt, the reference to the ISM, to the major schools of the 20th century, can be sensed in many of these works. The turn to the domain of the material is itself revealing. The beads applied in rocaille form geometric patterns with consciously empty spaces that expose the texture of the canvas. They invari- ably bring to mind the textile oeuvre of an Anni Albers, and even more strongly the coarse rhythm of early Stella works, where the exposed canvas triumphs as a pictorial element. Not a few of Sabine Boehl’s works dig even deeper into the temporal repertoire of the history of art and shapes. We repeatedly encounter a selection of mythological beasts, usually embedded in rampant gro- tesques, that form the vibrating frame for a world of owls, ravens and carnivores. Often we encounter endless ornamental loops that are placed like a dense network over the mathematically fascinating pattern of the early Islamic Girih tiles, with their infinite reflections of stars and meanders.

This catalogue has been published for Sabine Boehl: Rendering Infinity exhibition held at Dirimart January 12th - February 12th, 2011

120 pp, color figures, pb, in Turkish-English bilingual.