Der Wunsch zu verschwinden

The book presents the three recent series Serien Cool Mild Pure Warm (Streetfile), EPS and Der Wunsch zu verschwinden (Camopedia) (The Desire to Disappear (Camopedia)) by artist Max Schulze. He is concerned with the question of where and how painting is created in the year 2021: what about the traditional categorisations of colour and form, figuration and abstraction, or surface and space? What paths does contemporary painting seek against this backdrop and what aesthetic power is inherent to it?

The 32 paintings of the series Der Wunsch zu verschwinden (Camopedia) are based on the 32 shades of the Alpina Feine, system, which Schulze uses to paint different camouflage patterns. This specially curated colour system is loaded with feel-good associations conjured up by marketing. These associations are upended with the use of the military camouflage pattern. Schulze is preoccupied with the question of why camouflage is omnipresent in fashion and design, especially today, in a time determined by many political and social changes

For the series Cool Mild Pure Warm (Streetfile) Schulze also draws on colour systems, which he combines with photographs of various paint attacks in public space. The result is a – not entirely unhumorous – commentary on the commercial exploitation of paint in colour systems, as well as its misappropriation via political "attacks" in public space.

The name of the EPS series refers to a material known by the brand name Styrofoam. Schulze sticks this onto abstract paintings, albeit not completely, but rather in a way that leaves parts of the underlying picture plane untouched. The picture underneath is concealed as it were as protected by the insulation. It creates a similarly ambivalent visual impression to that which is experienced in the other series.