Burg 2018

Eckart Hahn made this painting called Burg, and it just throws you into a world of flat, graphic shapes and intense colour. I'm really drawn to how Hahn uses a limited palette, mostly yellows and reds, against a dark background, to create this surreal, almost cartoonish image. There's something so striking about the flatness of the yellow bird-like form, but then you notice the incredible detail in the rendering of its feathers and beak. It's like he's playing with different modes of representation, mixing abstraction with hyperrealism. And that rope, painted in these vivid blues, adds another layer of weirdness, contrasting the flatness of the yellow shape. The artist brings so much attention to the textures; the surface almost feels touchable. This piece reminds me a bit of René Magritte, with its dreamlike quality and unexpected juxtapositions. I’m left wondering if Hahn is trying to tell us something about the nature of representation itself, that art is an invitation to play with what we see, to question our assumptions, and to embrace the ambiguity of interpretation.