Painting and poetry: all sorts of driftwood

Anyone looking for the sea will find it in Kreuzberg. In a small, rectangular basement room in an old Berlin building, the Klek, it smells of wet paint and soft jazz is playing. Here, painting does not take place on large canvases, but on a piece of found wood, on cardboard or on fabric: Sebastian Lettner's exhibition “no more home” has space on three bright, white walls.

Small, square, round, long, wavy, colorful, wooden objects are neatly arranged next to each other. One focus is on nature, which Lettner shows not in landscape motifs, but in rich colors and materiality. A palm-sized, pentagonal piece of wood is painted with bright orange oil paint, streaked with turquoise blue. The light wood is still visible on the sides of the object. Lettner called this piece “small sunrise”.

Here, intense, deep blue flashes on a round wooden disc, reminiscent of a stormy wave. Opposite is a second one, its grey-blue paint reflects the sea after the storm. Lettner made a broad brush stroke with white wall paint on one of the many driftwood objects. On the remaining bare wood, “Lily” is scrawled in blue pen. Lily probably already existed when Lettner found the wood. With the white wall paint, the wood has now changed hands; the paint conveys the search for a home.

In general, Lettner works almost exclusively with found objects, collecting them, appropriating them, and setting them up. Found objects and everyday materials are removed from their original context and placed in new relationships. The objects carry traces of use and memory and appear like fragments of an unknown order; are familiar and at the same time mysterious, without wanting anything. In their existence they only convey their existence and do not urge any action.

Lettner likes to travel and travels a lot; the aimlessness of his travels produces the accumulation of impressions and material traces. Lettner's artistic career was also influenced by Sean Scully, with whom he studied. In Lettner, Scully's geometric order is expanded by found objects and traces of reality. Lettner's artistic expression does not end with painting; his imagery can be found in photography and poetry; He will present the booklet “Sea Notes���, edited by Cyrill Lachauer, on October 4th in the KSTN project room at Schönleinstraße 10 in Kreuzberg from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m.