Women
salzburg Art
"I forget about finished pictures right away"
EVA KAISER, 51 She was a student of the provocative artist Hermann Nitsch. Today, she herself is involved in the international art market with her expressive-actionist style. We visited the exceptional artist in her studio.
Eva Kaiser invited us to visit her in Werfen in Pongau. For a year now, the artist has been living in seclusion on an old farm in the small village with just under 3000 inhabitants. "Together with my partner Johann, I have lovingly renovated it. My current studio was originally an old cowshed. We invested a lot of work in the renovation," says Eva, who used to live in Salzburg.
She paints an average of 100 pictures a year in this tranquil ambience. Some of them are commissioned works for art lovers - many are presented in galleries and at major exhibitions in America, Asia and Europe.
"The sources of my inspiration are often mysticism, the subconscious and religions," says Kaiser, who describes herself as a "Christian but doesn't go to church". Her favourite motif is human bodies. "I also encounter criticism with that. People have gotten upset in front of my gallery that nudes are too naked, condemning bodies as too abstract." However, she emphasises, her paintings are not meant to be socially critical, but simply thought-provoking.
IN THE CRADLE. Even as a child, Eva was often told that she could draw better than average: "So learning a creative profession was almost preordained." So in 1983 she completed her training as a textile designer. "After that, I was immediately pushed into self-employment, designing bed linen and selling my first paintings to acquaintances." Her private life was also enriched. She married and had two children who are now adults.
The marriage did not last, but the professional success did. Eva Kaiser managed to finance her life with painting and finally met Professor Hermann Nitsch in 2003, who encouraged her talent. " He was a good teacher and taught me a lot in terms of technique". Because of his idiosyncratic artistic style, Nitsch polarises; Eva Kaiser has unreserved respect for this important representative of Viennese Actionism: "His art will go down in history." She herself also developed her very own expressionist style, in which she is simply guided by her feelings:" when I paint, I don't sketch anything out, I just start. My technique is wet-on-wet painting. This involves painting into the paint while it is still wet. You have to be quick so that nothing dries up." Only during her work does she invent stories about her works.
The artist has already produced around 1500 paintings , and for ten years she has successfully run Art Gallery 91 (evakaiser.com) in Kaigasse, in the centre of Salzburg's old town. " My partner Johann takes care of all the trappings of my gallery and plans all the exhibitions."
Organisational help for which Eva Kaiser is visibly grateful. "I wouldn't do that well. Alone because I can't remember any numbers. I only remember my children's birthdays by chance," she laughs. Being relieved, she reveals, is especially important before big exhibitions. The pressure is often enormous; she often works on a painting for 16 hours at a stretch. The number of her collectors is growing steadily; commissioned paintings are a special challenge. Art lovers often specify a theme, which Eva then translates individually onto canvas. "An exhibition theme was once "Risk". At first I painted the Odyssey and thought that it hit the theme perfectly. When the painting was finished, I realised that I was completely off the mark."
Transience. Asked about the value of a painting, she is cautious: "That can't be generalised, but really big paintings are worth a few thousand euros. The 51-year-old does not build up an emotional attachment to her paintings, as some colleagues do. "I have been practising Kriya Yoga for 15 years. The focus is on conscious breathing, non-thinking and letting go. In the meantime, I have internalised all this as a philosophy of life. When a painting is finished and I sell it, I forget about it. I'm not interested in this constant harping on the past. After all, all we have is the present and the future." And things are looking good for Eva Kaiser: In the coming months she will be exhibiting in New York, Berlin and at the art fair cologne.
STEFANIE SPREITZER
