MURTCEPS / TAKFEM AT Painting

I was born in Cologne, Germany, and as a child spent a lot of time in the Ardennes (Belgium) and at the Costa Brava (Catalunya, Spain). I currently live and work between Berlin and York (UK). I started drawing and painting as a two-year old, and received praise for my "work" throughout my childhood and adolescence. Art was my favourite subject (with Philosophy) by a mile, and, although curricular restrictions kept me from engaging more deeply, I felt very encouraged by my arts teacher, Mr Tillmann. Nearing the end of school, I was discouraged by my surroundings, made to believe that a career in art is likely a fruitless exercise. Many years of moving from place to place for work and further education kept me from engaging with my love of art. In 2016 a personal crisis made me shift my focus in life and I started painting again. In some sense my work took off from where I had left things at the age of 20, but the wealth of experiences I have gained since then became the unequivocal engince of my creative direction. My travels -- both inward and out in the world, my world views, my insights into the organisation of human societies, our interaction with other species, the planet and the universe at large, my endeavours into the outer spaces of the philosophy of physics, of mind, of the human condition all inform the source of my creativity. I mostly work with acrylic paint on canvas -- fairly conventional. I am somehow bound by a rule that doesn't allow anything but horizontal application of paint. For this I normally use pieces of plastic that I cut and recycle from PET food packaging. Most of my recent work involves geometric patterns as lenses through which I try to depict experiences of times spent in certain landscapes. I also do some work with painted paper, cardboard and cloth that I cut and rearrange into geometric patterns. I sometimes call these pieces mosaics. In the winter I sometimes work on experimetal pieces, where I use aquarelles, combined with various chemicals, such as isopropyl alcohol, on heavy aquarelle paper. These pieces are usually of a small format (around A4). I am entirely self-taught (barring the education I received at primary and secondary school, and an aquarelle course I took at during kindergarten). I have neither worked with other artists, nor won any prizes, nor exhibited any of my work at this point. Some of my work is kept in private collections.