Dirk Skreber’s tense paintings playfully insinuate narratives without explicitly formulating them. Behind the seductive hyperrealism of some of his paintings of familiar, everyday objects (caravans, suburban houses or roof landscapes), the uncanny makes its presence felt.

Apparently sober images of natural catastrophes and car accidents take on the aesthetic attraction of the macabre, fostered in the viewer by unpleasant memories, fantasies of being overwhelmed, or a feeling of indirect threat.

Skreber’s exhibition, Blood Speed focuses on his work of the past eight years and provides the most comprehensive survey to date of the artist’s multifaceted oeuvre.

Published to accompany the exhibition at Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, 9 February – 13 April 2008 and museum franz gertsch, Burgdorf, 4 July – 26 October 2008.