HERE EVERYTHING IS DIFFERENT

When Andreas Streicher asked me to write a short statement for his first monograph, I gladly agreed. I assumed that I would write a contribution in which I would write his work under the "Microscope of Art History" would illuminate. As I have already done with many other catalog introductions that I have been asked for. But then it turned out differently.

One thing soon became clear to me, after I had received the first galley proofs: the artist himself had already spoken intensively about his pictures, their origin and the intellectual background. All I would write now would be just repetitions, redundancies with a different word choice. But: Because here - in this catalog - everything is different anyway than with others, the question arose for the "why" of this unusual design. And so I changed my concept. So I would like to share with you, reading these lines, the thought of Andreas Streicher on this book, which you might never have learned without my change of concept.

I was fortunate enough to get to know him and his work almost two decades ago and the developmental steps he has taken since then as well. And I also had the pleasure of talking to him in detail about the idea for this book. An idea that fits seamlessly into his conceptual art approach and extends it quite logically and naturally.

The title "Evolution" of his current series, or series that are constantly growing, proves to be conclusive and coherent. This can be confirmed if one has dealt with his work closer. However, to grasp this development in terms of its complexity helps to understand the meaning of the word evolution.

Evolution comes from the Latin "evolvere" and can be translated with roll out, roll out, develop. At the same time, however, this means that the respective end result of an evolution must relate to an initially existing core. A core, which forms a starting point in the innermost of development, but which in the course of its further development can transform itself and form something new.

Andreas Streicher not only understood this principle and brought it to perfection in his series. He has it - so you can call it casual - completely inhaled. And in the evolutionary sense, in which something happens on a biological basis, without this being due to previous reflection efforts. The understanding that one's own art is subject to a certain evolution and that it can be documented, viewed from several sides and interpreted, is essential for the development of the works of Andreas Streicher. Born from the idea of opposing the bombs of 9/11, to which he had barely escaped, he designed his pictures standard almost as if from a logical constraint to the present day. It is clear that this creation is far from complete and the series has formed so many branches that it probably takes more than one human life to come to an endpoint.

I do not want to anticipate the artist's explanations here, but still draw attention to a phenomenon that immediately springs to mind when you leaf through this book. Among many pictures are gray colored placeholders.These are further stages of development, which can result from the respective predecessor images, but which have not yet been tackled.
With this idea to show something that does not yet exist and yet to capture this "something" visually, Streicher also defined another evolution for this book. Knowing that this volume is just an up-to-date inventory that will look quite different in a few years, his idea came to make the evolution of his art visible through this and other books that follow.
That artist books are only printed in a small edition, is well known.:
Not only because the sales market is not that big. The idea of understanding the book itself as an art object is not new either. The idea, however, to let others follow a monograph that evolutionarily evolves from the first one.

Anyone who has ever been involved in a book production knows about the difficulty of putting a line in the editorial board.To say: now it's enough and it's fine the way it is.
Still one would like to supplement a little, write something that seems important to you.
This phenomenon is particularly pronounced in the scientific field, which changes so rapidly that one can be sure that just a few weeks and months after the publication, much new knowledge will have accumulated, which clearly could not be taken into account.
That is also one of the reasons why many dissertations lie unfinished in thousands of drawers. When creating art catalogs, however, it is clear after a certain selection process what will and will not find room in it. Once this step has been taken, an attempt is made to conceive the book in such a way that it forms a self-contained unity that makes visible a certain creative period or even the entire oeuvre.

This book, in which you are reading, has a different starting point. Neatly numbered and personally signed, only 150 people will be allowed to call it their own. And - also looking forward - to get more evolutionary copies. Namely, those follow-up volumes, in which one by one the gray areas will fill, on the other hand maybe new ones are added. Those that arise only from the study of the individual topics and that will provide completely new developments.
The again logical consequence means:
Not only that a small edition makes a book in and of itself more valuable than one that has a high circulation. Andreas Streicher's first monograph is embedded in his personal art concept, is part of it and thus itself a piece of art.

In this sense, you hold here a book in which everything is different. Pantha rhei - everything flows - Heraklit already knew how to pin down the permanence of the living change process so well. Andreas Streicher opens a new chapter on this topic with his series and especially with this book. Follow him on this path and let yourself be surprised how the other volumes will look like. Accompany him on his developmental path, which is ultimately also one that will trigger developmental steps - whichever way - in you.

Dr. MICHAELA PREINER
European Cultural News