Controlled Chaos: Lance Dehn� – By Tobias Verlende

I arrived at the Berliner Kunstprojekt in the multi cultural district in Berlin-Kreuzberg late on a Saturday night.

Controlled Chaos: Lance Dehn�

By Tobias Verlende

 

 

 

 

I arrived at the Berliner Kunstprojekt in the multi cultural district in Berlin-Kreuzberg late on a Saturday night. The exhibition of Lance Dehn� �s exhibition space occupies a bright white room with high ceilings. He needs space, light, and bright surroundings because of the overall impression his work gives.

The first piece is a mixed media paper set, titled Eng, 3,9,13,12,11,10,2. Entering the room, pictures seem very colorful but still resting more conventional forms of imagery. Like looking at the earth from outer space, it seems so peaceful and quiet but closer inspection will correct this impression. My experience entering the gallery space mimicked this transformation. I was suddenly in the cosmos that he had prepared for me. All the paintings are made on old architecture maps, shining through in places where the paint is thinner, creating a copy of the world for us. Full of colors, action, and power, hundreds of small sketches use lines, images, and shapes to fascinate the viewer. The most interesting thing about the way Dehn� puts together all the colorful and wild chaos of this set of paintings are the interconnections between them. Dehn� brings together the bits and pieces of everyday experience to form a cohesive artistic narrative with the magical eyes of an engineer and tries to explain the connections in our chaotic world.

At the end Dehn� makes a wonderful 2-part trick. First, he shows the wild world in plain black-and white architects� plan. In his brilliant second step Lance Dehn� then shows us the world in Technicolor: fast and furious, and dependent on our interactions and responses to each situation. We find the connections to our real life.

On another wall is the second set of paintings. With Eng 3,9,13,12,11,10,2 pictures still visible in the corner of your eye, these have an incredibly peaceful and relaxed impression. This set consists of 8 paintings made between 2003- 2004. Dehn� again uses lots of bright colours, reminiscent of Dali and Colani, using aerodynamic functunal shapes to build up situations and circumstances of our daily life. However, these paintings are different because all of the lines are clearly delineated. Everything is clean and round, even the shadows the constructions are making. In this set of paintings Dehn� puts the emphasis on the explanation of the single theme of the pictures. He chooses the colors, lines, and shapes carefully in order to make it easy for to communicate meaning. The second set of paintings is a very detailed plan of special topics, like an engineers� plans that can only be used if everything down to the very smallest detail is perfectly arranged. Whereas in the first set Dehn� tried to explain the overall connections in the chaotic world, in the second set he paints as an engineer who explains the very detailed shapes and forms of the things we come across in our lives.

Both of the sets of paintings are very special in their way, but what makes the Lance Dehn� exhibition in the Berliner Kunstprojekt a special experience is the fact that two so different sets of paintings are put together, with the main themes, connections, and relationships shining through and very clearly making lasting impressions. The viewer will walk home trying to find the small pieces and bits outdoors worlds contain and be very sensitive to looking for the small lines and connections between the things happening around him.