Boy water 2003

Editor: This is Christian Attersee's "Boy Water" from 2003, crafted with acrylic paint. The intense blues contrasting with these vivid yellows give me such a whimsical, almost dreamlike feeling. The shapes, though abstract, feel vaguely familiar, organic, perhaps? How do you interpret this piece? Curator: Dreamlike is a fine starting place; these floating, luminous forms – a chorus of joyful yellows bobbing in an aqueous indigo world – they suggest the boundless possibilities of imagination itself. Attersee always struck me as less a painter and more an orchestrator of sensory delight. See how the angular geometric interruptions fight against the free flowing biomorphic figures, ever the fight for form? Editor: I do notice how some shapes interrupt and even seem to contain those bright colors! It's like the painting is playful and thoughtful, but also fighting itself at the same time! Curator: Exactly. "Boy Water," the title hints at fluidity, youthful exuberance and I feel that. Doesn't the almost aggressive abstraction have an innocence of a child's drawing? His works become these little theatre stages that play the balance between conscious design and subconscious freeform expression. Does Attersee manage to tickle the pleasure-principle of seeing, for you? Editor: Absolutely! It feels refreshing to look at this chaos but in such a playful composition! Thank you for shedding some light into his mindset! Curator: My pleasure. Art's ultimate secret? How it reflects us more than it reflects the artist's first intention, a splash-pool for seeing the self, perhaps!