About

2015 - 2020

The structure of the picture surface is becoming increasingly important over the years. Paint is applied opaquely or in many layers and then removed again with all kinds of tools, such as sandpaper, a sander or a drill. Overpainted parts of the picture are thus revealed. This creates structures that are partially painted over again.

Over time, wave-like patterns come into focus, covering the whole picture. They resulted in a rhythm of color and form. Through the wave patterns can be seen through, so the foreground and background merge, result in an interplay. The picture in the background becomes unclear by the foreground pattern of the waves, it gets a mystical impression. The background image can be representational or abstract. The shapes of the waves are also created with the technique of woodcut. 

In order to make the structures of the waves of the painted pictures again more recognizable as a uniform form, some pictures are worked on with the computer. Painted images become computer generated images. The blur gives the forms of the waves additionally something unapproachable.

Early works

The early phase of creation is characterized by experimentation. The figures are a reflection of a Western society in which the individual, decoupled from the family, is increasingly lonely. Further drawings are created in which man, half earthly and half divine being, finds spiritual experience in his loneliness.

Biography

Christian Elmiger was born in 1976 and grew up in Lucerne, Switzerland. In 1993, he graduated from the free art class of the school Material & Form in Lucerne and began his own artistic activity. After completing the preliminary course at the Zurich University of the Arts ZHdK (1995) and attending the specialist class for graphic design at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts HSLU (1996), Christian Elmiger has worked invarious advertising agencies since and independently as a graphic designer since 2004. Since 2011 he has also been studying social work at the University of Applied Sciences in Zurich (ZHAW).