Exhibitions

HANS SCHMITT-MATZEN: THE INVISIBLE KING

Carlos Gallery (The University of the South) / 105 Kennerly Rd., Sewanee, TN January 19, 2018 - March 13, 2018

Hans Schmitt-Matzen

In The Invisible King, Schmitt-Matzen translates the drawings of his two young sons into larger wall sculptures. The sustained process of deciphering his children’s innate language of marks allows him to discover shared aspects of the human condition and gain a greater understanding of what they think and feel. Often these collaborative creations are realized as neon signs, a grand medium designed for announcements within the public sphere. The neon artworks are essentially light drawings, poetic non-objects that harness a symbol of the sublime and unruly. Schmitt-Matzen states, “Light is the fastest thing that we know and that makes it a perfect metaphor for representing fleeting moments of comprehension.”

Other pieces in the exhibition originate from drawings made by his own hand while he attempts to absorb his children’s unrestricted sense of play. He states, “I work as they work, and generate hundreds of simple line drawings. I make selections from these drawings looking for forms that are simultaneously identifiable as signifiers and yet mysteriously unreadable. I talk to my boys about their interpretations of the lines and those conversations guide many decisions.” Often the final works are made from wood and sculpture compounds to appear as though they were relics of an ancient time. They are like stone ciphers meant to decode some enduring universal message.