Novalis, Blüthenstaub 1798, Poems and Prose

“Before abstraction everything is one, but one like chaos; after abstraction everything is united again, but this union is a free binding of autonomous, self-determined beings. Out of a mob a society has developed, chaos has been transformed into a manifold world.”

Sunda's Song

I created Sunda's song, consisting of 24 ink drawings, in Hagen in October 1989.

I took on the task of starting one drawing at the beginning of every consecutive hour over the course of the next days. The first one I started on 13th October, 6 am and the last one of the series on 30th October, 5 am. Some of the drawings were created on the same day. Date and time of creation are noted on each painting.

For this purpose I discovered the surrealists' “automatic writing” (reduce semantic influence and enhance the work pace) to be quite useful: my personal rhythm should guide my pen.

An Edding was the tool of choice for the black background. I stippled the fine black lines on the paper with a Rapidograph, the traditional technical ink drawing pen. After some practice the ink was appearing on the paper as drawn by a ghost's hand and displayed my state with straight, tilted or curved lines. It showed what forced me into the angular or detail and how I connected to the forms and shapes. These drawings are the results of automatism and control.