Barbara Seiler

“Technology, the world of our devices, is either featureless, nondescript, and obscure or it is deliberately kept out of sight. Anyone who has imagination to rely on instead of eyes (for these are today no use) will see that it is this invisibility, the invisibility of the monsters, that is the monstrosity of today. This invisibility has turned us into beings, whose lives blindly pass by the machines, for we maintain a most obsolete trust in our eyes. Until the day at least, when we have run out of time to realize that today our eyes cannot be trusted.” (Günther Anders)

What does it mean to live in a world in which technology is progressing at an ever-faster pace, while our eyes are glued to screens behind which this incomprehensible reality remains hidden? With his now almost 50-year-old verdict about technology’s invisibility and monstrous traits, Günther Anders wanted to alert us to an ever-wider gap between the world of our devices and our own limited imagination and inability to see what future they are leading us towards: “When humans release their products into the world, they reap their haunting in return.” Although seemingly rendered transparent, we do not live in a see-through world. Seen by the world, we cannot see in return. Neither a mirror nor a reflection, it holds us with its mesmerizing gaze.

This text by Christopher Mueller comes to mind when we look at the newest body of work by Swiss artist Daniel Karrer (*1983 in Binningen, CH). Karrer is a painter through and through. His works are firmly anchored in the tradition of painting, but at the same time integrate new possibilities of the digital age in a natural way: Karrer collages his motifs from self-created or found images in Photoshop and then develops them further in oil, often in a continuous interplay between analog and digital process. In his mostly deserted scenes, figuration and abstract elements come together, the surreal meets the minimalist, and in the special technique of reverse glass painting an expressive, gestural brushstroke is captured behind a compact, smooth surface reminiscent of computer screens or touch screens of mobile phones. The special glow of the pictures presented here stems precisely from the unusual surface materiality of the glass, which reproduces the applied colors in a richly radiant manner.

In his first solo exhibition titled RE with Barbara Seiler he presents mostly abstract paintings. But are they really abstract? Isn’t there an object, and if yes, what kind of object, hiding underneath the various layers of paint that push into the foreground? Karrer deliberately keeps this open and veils instead of reveals. And to quote Christophe Mueller again: “Although he is seen by the world, he cannot simply look back from the other side of the glass, one does not know who is watching or why this is happening. And yet the imagination remains, which as a mirror can reflect not only spook but also something more human.”

Daniel Karrer’s work is currently on view at Museum zu Allerheiligen, Schaffhausen, CH in the group exhibition ‘Ohne Titel – Junge Malerei aus Süddeutschland und der Deutschschweiz’ and at Verein für Originalgraphik (VfO) Zurich, CH. Recent exhibitions include ‘(UN)CERTAIN GROUND at Centre Pasquart, Biel CH and ‘High5’ at Helvetia Art Foyer, Basel CH.