ECKART HAHN | ROPES & CHAINS

Press Release

PABLO’S BIRTHDAY is pleased to present its seventh solo show of the work of Eckart Hahn.

In the paintings of this new series Hahn sets a stage, wherein, by combining elements of underlaying narrative, with a physical tension evoked by masterful representation of materiality, he creates a synergy of form and semantic that transcends a literal reading of his work. A kind of dialectic between the real and the unreal is left as an open question hanging in our imagination - that is, the “fact” of what is perceived, in it’s hyper-reality, and the impossible dream-like situation of the scene, introduce a cognitive dissonance that coaxes the viewer into a search for symbolist meaning.

However, rather than pushing us to didactic conclusions, these exquisitely painted surfaces open us to a bottomless inquiry of what lurks within.

Animals interact with ropes and chains but seem un-menaced, as if they inhabit another place beyond gravity and constraint - Perhaps they embody a timeless wisdom? Archetypes of our subconscious? Are these warnings the artist would have us heed?

In the power play between nature and man, freedom and control, Hahn seems to suggest there is something bigger going on here.