Götz Valien: Dear Painter

About

The work of the artist, who has lived in Berlin since 1985, is characterized by a virtuoso objectivity which he calls „virtual realism“ and which is fed by a tightly woven network of references into popular culture and the history of painting. The works on display are all large formats with a high visual appeal. Valien has mastered the techniques of creating perspective illusions as well as means borrowed from advertising. His constructed imagery – in some cases also re-enactments of famous masterpieces – ultimately aim not only at the eye, but also at the brain as an essential organ of reception.

Goetz Valien was trained by studying painting from 1980 to 1985 at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. He has been working as a freelance movie poster painter in Berlin since 1992 and is considered one of the best of his craft in this dying profession. It was through this sideline that he received the order from Martin Kippenberger to create an interior view of the Paris Bar …