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2025 / 2026

Wieweit trägt uns die Hoffnung?

2024 in between

2024 timekeepers of the alps

In the 18th and 19th centuries, Swiss watchmakers created technical masterpieces in the form of iconic luxury watches. The most important inventors include: Pierre Jaquet-Droz (1758-1790) specialized in the manufacture of automaton and musical clocks. Abraham-Louis Breguet (1747-1823), who invented the tourbillon in 1801. Antoine Norbert de Patek (1812-1877) and Jean Adrien Philippe (1815-1894), with the company Patek Philippe, are considered the inventors of the winding crown. Louis Elisée Piguet (1836-1924), whose perpetual calendar is considered one of the most fascinating and sought-after complications in fine watchmaking.
These watch brands have survived to this day, demonstrating technical precision and a traditional consistency in the human approach to time. Today, they represent an intangible cultural heritage for mankind.
Timepieces are measuring instruments that make the passing of time unmistakably visible. They act as signaling devices for the ephemeral. In contrast to this are the Alps, which have grown over millions of years and form a backdrop for the supposedly infinite. However, it is clear that the seemingly idyllic snow-covered Alpine landscape with its ice glaciers is under threat.

2024 ghostly ships on the wind

The series ‘ghostly ships on the wind’ consists of 15 paintings that have never been realised in such a technical form before. The difficulty of the artistic concept lies in the symbiosis of the depiction of a technical drawing from the early 20th century and contemporary painting. The creation of the work builds a bridge between technical precision and artistic impulsiveness. Thus a new form of visual perception can be established.

As a member of a traditional sailing club on Berlin’s Wannsee, I discovered in its art collection ship plans and construction drawings of sailing yachts designed between 1900 and 1911 by the renowned German yacht designer Max Oertz (1871-1929) and some by Otto Protzen (1868-1925). Oertz had a signi- ficant impact on German yacht building at the be- ginning of the 20th century. Many of the yachts like Sonderklasse, Nationale Kreuzer and racing yachts were developed by him. Reference is made to the designs commissioned by Kaiser Wilhelm II and others. The sensual impression of the parchments and blueprints, the clear lines on them and the notes on the structural realisation of the drawings are fascinating.

The artistic design in the present day combines the mathematical abstractions of Max Oertz and Otto Protzen with abstract motifs of Lake Wannsee as seen from the water. The precise lines offer the pos- sibility of transforming engineering – in this case the building of ships – into a completely new context. This requires a sound knowledge of the structure of a construction drawing in order to fully understand the functioning of a sailing ship. By examining the ship’s outlines, the historical construction process returns to the collective memory and is thus kept alive and preserved for future generations.As not all of the designs were realised, this series of works is called ‘ghostly ships on the wind’. In these works the ideas of the two shipbuilders revive. In fact, the yachts are launched, also those which were never built.