10 Questions with Nicola Barth

Nicola Barth, born in 1966 in Mölln - lives and works today in Langen near Frankfurt am Main.

She completed her master’s degree in German language and literature, theater, film, television studios, and psychology at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main. But soon, she put her pen out of her hand and picked up a brush, changed languages, and found new forms of expression. Since 2013, Nicola Barth has been dealing with permanent metamorphic processes that take place in non-obvious areas. In it, she visualizes ideas of becoming and changing, the glances of figures that are not, combines poetry and chaos, and brings them to canvas and paper with graphite and oil paint. She has been exhibiting regularly since 2002.

www.nicola-barth.de | @nicola.barth

 ARTIST STATEMENT

"Nicola Barth is dealing with permanent metamorphic processes in non-obvious areas. Her work can be understood as an insight into a temporally and spatially limited development process section. Sculptures and manipulated photos complement painting and drawing mainly in oil. The content follows the same principle and is as abstract and surreal as her paintings. There is indeed a world behind this world. And it's constantly moving. As a philosopher without words, she tries to make milk glass permeable. 

The driving force of her painting is the gain of knowledge. She paints out of an inner dilemma: the impossibility of thinking the world through to the end. In other words: she paints what she doesn't understand but desire to understand."

INTERVIEW

Could you tell us a little more about your background? How did you shift from literature to painting and art?

“When everything is loose and in constant movement, 
everything reacts with everything else,
everything finds itself constantly in a process,
there is nothing really finished, 
and when time and space are only fixed ideas, 
then deception and change
are confusion and chance.“ 

This fast pace of life in nature and our society and the rapid digital progress demands a stop, a standstill, a retreat to follow. My analog answer to this is painting. Because my words are not enough.

I studied literature (and theater, film and television, and psychology) and wanted to write myself at some point. That's what I did at the beginning: poetry, short prose, book reviews, articles for daily newspapers, and literary magazines. Gaining knowledge drives me. I am inquisitive and curious, and I want to see what is behind the curtain, under the surface of the water, above the clouds.

I gave birth to two children, and the existential questions that drive us all became louder and clearer. How can I explain to my children who we are? Who am I? Where do we come from? Where are we going? Why are we here? What is our purpose?

I had to put down my pen and take up a paintbrush because what I want to understand and explain is so complex that I cannot express it in words. We can not think of the world to the end. It is not to be grasped by the mind. Language is usually unambiguous, is controlled by the mind, and lifts us to a conformist level. Painting, on the other hand, deviates from the norm. It leads from the deep into the depth of an experience of being. It is a more open form of communication, grasped with other senses, and leaves more room for maneuver and freedom. Here it is about experiencing and not understanding.

In non-objective painting, I can show a part of what I do not understand but desire to understand. I do not know what I paint, but I see it as a small subjective section of a large whole process that is constantly in morphological change, and I take the liberty of making a cut-out.

Therefore, the triad names of my paintings like HONO BADI NISS and DULUSCH ET IGANI are rather be understood as a sound or a frequency and are meant to point to the inner idea of things. There is indeed a world behind this world. And it's constantly moving. As a philosopher without words, I try to make milk glass permeable.

What is your personal aim as an artist?

Yes, that's a question of definition now.....Target always means that something stops somewhere. You can reach a goal, but I don't see art as something with a beginning and an end. For me, being artistically active is an ongoing process, and it's a never-ending story, so to speak...

For me, the idea of transformation and the question "what can I do with this stuff, how can I use it, how can I transform it? "is always there. And to implement an idea once it has been conceived is a great need that cries out for fulfillment. I don't have any other option either, because I can't imagine my life without doing art in some form. It is like stuck in me. As an artist, you have developed a certain view of the things around you and can't just put it aside.

The artist is a thermometer, barometer, reflector, and projector of mostly still unconscious images and ideas. He has different tasks: to look at time critically, to create something that has never been in this world before, to reach people, and sensitize them. So I have a privilege and a task. I have been given tentacles and would like to do good, valuable work and, of course, be rewarded accordingly.

How can I do good work? By constantly questioning myself and my art: is my work/painting authentic? Present? Strong enough? Unflinching? Is it consistent? Does it speak its own language? Is it alive?  

As a painter, I have not set myself the task of painting beautiful and real pictures. But they should be authentic and unperturbed. This is my claim. 

My Focus is on development and change - in life and art. This demands me as a free spirit and a constant self-renewal and review for myself and what I create. I mature in my art - and my art matures in me, that's how it should be.

There is a very beautiful quote by Henry David Thoreau. I have written this to so many people on birthday cards (not just artists!!!): "What lies before us and what lies behind us are nothing compared to what lies within us. When we take what lies within us out into the world, miracles happen."

I very much want to be an inspiration to those around me, in my art, and my existence. That's where the journey goes... So I am looking forward to people, projects, and ideas crossing my path.

Tell us about the colors on your palette and anything new you have been experimenting with. 

In origin, I am a painter, these are my roots, and there I always move back again and again. But as soon as the given frame gets narrow, I have to leave and move three-dimensionally in space. Then I make sculptures, photograph them, edit the photos digitally and bring them back into a two-dimensional plane. It's like a trip.

I always want to try something new. If I know how a picture or a technique "works," then it gets boring for me. After all, I want to develop further. This does not mean that I don't take into account everything I've learned. Certain well-functioning techniques are incorporated into my new work.

These excursions away from the canvas always end up feeding back into my work. For example, for two years, I created unique pieces of fashion with four other creative women. That was a great experience, a bubbling kitchen of ideas, and the preoccupation with fabrics, leather, skins does not let me go today and is always found in rudiments, either in my sculptures or in sewn papers. 

Many of my works have to do with transformation and creation, but that is also logical and conclusive for me because that's what I'm all about in terms of content. For example, since 2017, I have started a series of works about "being in spaces that are none". As a basis for this group of works served two three-dimensional objects that I had placed in space in a dialogue with each other. These (analog) sculptures I then photographed, the photograph was digitally processed and again digitally printed. Finally, then again, completely designated, painted, brought back into the analog level of painting. 

The "beings in spaces that are not" are located on a meta-level, in a world behind. In undefined (because in the process) spaces. I try to give an idea of possible processes that could take place in non-obvious areas - between this world and beyond. 

And what can I say about my painting? I do what I have always done. That's my home base, my safe territory. Simply painting. Create. Allow process. Penetrate, interweave layers, organize open compositions or let them organize themselves, condense, extract, obscure... I prefer oil, like the large format... Between conscious choice and coincidences....and then sometimes figurative associations force themselves.

I gave these more space last year. I have long been concerned with the question: What should I represent if I were to paint figuratively? Till Eulenspiegel, the fool from my birthplace came to mind. A folly and playful it should be.

In summer academy with Markus Lüpertz this year, I worked on a series of naive-figurative paintings. These works on paper, all in the format 100 x 70 cm I have under the title. "I am ready for miracles". Again, it is about change and development, this time in terms of gender and gender roles, identity, and the individual. Humorous and at times provocative. Whether this was an excursion or I'll continue to work on it, I can't say yet.

And what else do I do? I draw small complex stories to accompany my work. That's my drawing, storytelling, journaling, diary, black on white, but they're all still in my drawer..... 

And then, of course, I can enjoy the technical progress and experiment with various digital image processing programs. This opens with and my transformation theme, of course, new worlds. Wonderful!

You have a whole series painted on music sheets. How important is music for your work?

Music is a monster and a hummingbird. No art form affects me as quickly, directly, and immediately as music. Music manipulates me like no other medium. It gets into my body and makes me move immediately. 

I love to dance (well and willingly) and sing (badly and secretly) for the life of me. Music is like a medicine, pill, drug that I have to handle/dose carefully. For me, there is good music (liveliness and vitality) and bad music, which can make good and bad feelings (sentimentality and aggression).

The music sheets were a lucky "flea market chance find" here; I was inspired by the material and its history. They have such a density and fragility of content: handwritten annotations and glued repaired pages. One wonders who had already worked with these notes under what conditions and is reminded of a time before the throwaway society. I myself can hardly read the notes, but I can put my artistic signature in oil on them, and again, we are at the transformation process, the change, the renewal.

What is the most challenging part of your work?

Fishing out of the sea of possibilities... To make a selection from the choice of means, to make decisions permanently is sometimes exhausting. If I look at the painting: nothing is too big, too small, too ugly, too colorful - you can paint with anything you can put in a paint pot, there are endless possibilities from which you can draw. There is no such thing as can't. There are no limits. You have to remember that we painters deal with the unfeasible. It is only a matter of being involved in the process and playing along. It is a matter of getting into a state that away from "I want to paint a picture" to the true experience.

The next biggest challenge is having to deal with being an outsider in society. You are in a special bubble that only a small percentage of the world's population is part of, and very few people understand what you are doing, let alone find it meaningful. Painting (or visual art in general) is a lonely "job," and you never really know if you are doing the right thing. There are no road signs and markings that show the way. There everyone must look for its own path through it. When that is done, you have to let go of the image and the process, release it, and take full responsibility for the work. 

Where do you find inspiration?

By walking the world with my eyes and ears open for inspiration. Maybe it's a bit like this: the artist has the ability to wander the world without losing the connection to reality, and he can bring something from "there." However, this "from there "is subject to different laws evaluation criteria. Nearly everything and everyone can be an inspiration for me, conversations, books, nature, special materials, rooms, and spaces. And of course, I join other artists in their exhibitions and studios and follow their work on Instagram or clubhouse.

So I am influenced by everything and everyone and always. For me, the more important question is: under what conditions are we ready for inspiration? 

In my experience, inspiration always comes spontaneously and unexpectedly. Often when I am doing quite profane everyday work. I think you need to be just opened and relaxed when searching for inspiration; I call it to be "on the air in off space. " Inspiration itself can't be forced, but the circumstances under which inspiration takes place can be influenced. Certain synapses in the brain have to be interconnected with each other, which is an involuntary process. It is always about input and output and the individual "in-between "that manifests itself in an artistic result. To my mind, an image or a sculpture or even music is a living organism that grows out of itself.

What do you hope that the public takes away from your work?

I would say: The main thing is added value.

That can be a smile, an AHA experience, self-awareness, a new unknown perspective.... and in economic terms, "I want to have that!".

I want to lure the viewers of my painting into new experiences, like leaving an impression. Art is ultimately experience and self-knowledge - for the artist himself and those who deal with the work. 

I think I have the possibility as a creator of art to invite my fellow human beings to come along and to get out of this norm-bound thinking. I invite people to follow me into other spaces. If what I have created is good, then I have created a new kind of imaginary space of experience for the viewer in which he can move and especially experience himself. And then I have created an added value. Of course, I would like to achieve this as often as possible.

But I am also concerned with the above-mentioned capture of a permanent metamorphosis. A moment of mindfulness that I want to keep for myself and reveal to others. This fast pace in our society and the rapid digital progress demands a stop, a standstill, a contemplation to get behind. I see my images as an arbitrary frozen still image of something that is in a permanent morphic process. Everything is constantly in motion; nothing remains. Time and space are in question. This can sometimes make you dizzy. I paint against the dizziness because "being one with" (resonate) is a way to resist the chaos.

What advice can you give to beginning artists?

No master falls from the sky. Good artists have always worked harder than average to achieve it with patience and perseverance. You need dedication, stamina, and high frustration tolerance. You should burn for what you do. 

"Only he who burns himself can kindle a fire in others"- Augustine.

The path is often rocky and exhausting and sometimes demands tsunami energy: be driven, fall, stand up and crown, be discouraged, be awake, brash, and present. Absolutely loyal and grateful to the people who helpfully accompany your path. But if this is what you really want, you will not find it difficult and get back the full energy from the creative process. Just as important as progressing in the art technique, refining, complementing, and expanding your work is your personal development. 

Join your colleagues in their exhibitions and studios. When you talk to artists about their work, you're almost always very close to the people, their ideas, their visions, what drives them. It's always about the essentials. It's important for your own work because it helps you reflect it and inspire you. You must learn who you are so that your art is personal and has integrity and authenticity, whether you paint, sing or dance. It should be entirely yours. 

Learn your frequency. Play your frequency. Broadcast on your frequency.

Do you have an essential philosophy that guides you in your creative expression?

So what?
There is no right and no wrong.
Trust in the process.

What was the art lesson you learned from last year's experience?

My world has become much smaller and much bigger at the same time. My private life has shrunk, and contacts with family and friends feel more precious and valuable. Back to the roots, back to nature, more peace, patience, serenity, and humility - much gratitude. Also, for being able to continue working in my studio.

In the context of painting, my horizons have expanded massively through digitization. I experience great also intercultural networking among creative people and a movement from I to WE. Borders are falling, the art world is becoming more transparent, and it's much more about the collective idea, collective wisdom. Together with my artist colleague DeDe Handon, I have developed an intercultural project for which we also received a working grant from the Hessian Cultural Foundation. We originally planned our "Echo Reply: Between Ping and Pong" project as an intercultural project art game to develop our common artistic themes further: Networking, Linking, Transformation, Shape-shifting, and Development Processes. 

And it should have its first start in April 2020 in the NEW SPACE ARTS FOUNDATION in Hue, Vietnam. Due to Corona, we could not start our residency last April, had to adapt the project to the pandemic, and, at the moment, are still playing in our immediate environment. But we have big visions and still many ideas for our project which we would like to present to the public soon. I think we are at the right time with it and hope for support. On occasion, so if anyone out there wants to learn more about our project, we would be happy to hear from you.