In June 2022, the ACADEMY SELECTION AWARD was presented for the first time at the Kellermann Düsseldorf Gallery, which is intended to honour young up-and-coming talent from the art academies. This year's award went to Düsseldorf Art Academy graduate Fabian Pfleger for his striking figurative painting with self-irony and philosophical depth. 

Alethea Magazine is present when artist and gallery owner meet for an exciting conversation in which Fabian Pfleger talks about the beginnings of his painting but also intensively discusses the sense and nonsense of academic art training.

Fabian Pfleger left his philosophy studies to become a painter at the art academy. His works have a special depth of thought and tell complex stories, whereby the figures and characters in Fabian Pfleger's works consist exclusively of self-portraits of the artist. In his largest work to date, "Adieu", Fabian Pfleger's graduation work from the art academy, the painter himself appears in over sixty characters. In the interview, one learns the extraordinarily logical and practical reasons for this. 

When philosophy student Fabian Pfleger arrived at the art academy in 2012, he had difficulties finding his way around. As he says, he lacked structures with the help of which he had imagined being able to justify his education. After initial studies in the field of abstraction, he finally found his way to figurative painting. Today, Fabian Pfleger sees his work as a countermovement to the numerous abstract trends in the field of young artists. 

August 28, 2022

Interview Directory 

ART

Name: Fabian Pfleger

Studies: Philosophy

Residence: Düsseldorf

Occupation: Philosopher, artist, graduate of the Düsseldorf Art Academy.

Prospects: Gifted artist whose art is beyond compare

Interview: Absolutely worth reading for all Düsseldorf art academy aspirants

In conversation with: Matthias Kellermann, owner of Galerie Kellermann, who represents the artist

How did your path to painting begin? 

Fabian Pfleger: After my Abitur in 2011, I first studied philosophy. Inspired by a classmate during my A-levels, I also started drawing for the first time at that time and got into it through the book by art teacher and psychologist Betty Edwards "Guaranteed to learn to draw!" (original title: "Drawing on the right side of the brain"). This book captivated me from the start because Ms Edwards' teaching method took a completely different approach to what I had expected. In a nutshell, her method assumes that everyone can draw, but is prevented by their own "habits of seeing" from depicting the world as they perceive it. 

As a student of philosophy, I was immediately reminded of the epistemologies of various philosophers, especially Immanuel Kant's famous "Critique of Pure Reason", in which he examines, among other things, the foundations of our empirical perception and describes how we organise our sensory impressions into an experience with the help of our intellect and its corresponding concepts. In Edwards' work, the word "mind" gives way to "brain" and she explains that many people do not draw what they see, but draw what they think they must have seen.  In 2012 I was accepted at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, then with cityscapes of Düsseldorf and portraits of my family and friends, which I had done with very impasto paint application, partly directly from the tube onto the canvas. 

After studying philosophy, how did you find the art academy as a student? 

To be honest, it was a real shock for me. I had learned how to draw and paint from my book so far and was now looking for an institution that could help me improve my technique and teach me tricks of the trade, for example, to depict certain effects faster or better. At the Düsseldorf Art Academy, however, there are unfortunately only fragments of such academic training for painters. 

For me personally, these were very difficult conditions to develop a healthy self-confidence in myself and my work. In my opinion, however, such self-confidence is indispensable in order to exist as an artist in the world and to be able to present one's work to a critical public and enter into a dialogue with it at eye level; which means nothing other than developing one's own artistic position, which is also the self-declared goal of the studio studies at the Düsseldorf Art Academy. 

©Fabian Pfleger

Matthias Kellermann: The Düsseldorf Art Academy is, of course, still very much in the tradition of Joseph Beuys and stands for a great deal of freedom. According to the Beuys school, everyone should do what they are capable of and every artist should discover it for themselves. 

"I can also understand that he and his generation founded a counter-movement to defend themselves against the structures that seemed outdated."

Fabian Pfleger: Beuys also comes from a time when there was still the traditional art education at the art academy that I expected when I enrolled there. Therefore, I can also understand that he and his generation founded a counter-movement to defend themselves against the structures that seemed outdated. 

However, this "counter-movement" is now rather the establishment and I would like to see a harmonious coexistence of the two movements at the art academy; in the hope that the future of art might consist of a kind of middle way or symbiosis of the two. 

Matthias Kellermann: Beuys had to cut off a lot of old habits in his time and completely redefine the art world. When Beuys was still a student, a sculpture had to be hewn from a block and a picture had to be painted in oil on a canvas. That was the only way art could be created according to the understanding of the time. It was Beuys who completely dissolved the concept of art and freed the art world from its old constraints. This freedom is - I think - still the guiding principle of the Academy today. 

"I see my work as a counter-movement to the counter-movement, because art can only ever be as relevant and modern as the people who make and receive it."

Fabian Pfleger: You are absolutely right, the concept of freedom is important but, in my view, precisely because of this, it should not be used as a kind of "fighting term" to stigmatise certain teaching methods or artistic positions as outdated and irrelevant. 

In this sense, I see my work as a counter-movement to the counter-movement, because art can only ever be as relevant and modern as the people who make and receive it; and although I am a child of my time, I simply find handcrafted, high-quality work in many areas of life much more appealing and beautiful than its modern counterparts that have emerged from corresponding counter-movements. 

The credo of the modern art academy seems to be: art is what is new. I find this intolerance of the modern over the traditional to be very unfashionable, almost cynical; and that's where I come in with my art theory and my work. 

Matthias Kellermann: As an artist, you have to take tradition and make something of your own, something new, out of it. In art there is no right and wrong, in the end an artist has to go his own way. 

Immendorff might have been a great teacher for Fabian. He painted in a decidedly figurative way and told profound stories with his works. Publicly, he was something like the rocker or better the punk of the art world. Perhaps the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig, with its figurative tradition, would have been an ideal training ground for Fabian; not for nothing did the New Leipzig School emerge here. 

Fabian takes up things in his works that we also know from a Neo Rauch. His works appear as if they had sprung from old folk art books. If you want to classify Fabian, you could perhaps call him a Düsseldorf representative of the New Leipzig School ...

"Isn't it a feature of our times that many people are so self-absorbed that they share practically their entire lives on social media and at the same time there is a huge audience that consumes and celebrates this content?"

Can you tell me about your figurative painting style and your inspirations? 

Fabian Pfleger: When I had reached a certain level of craftsmanship in the course of my studies, I first invited models I had met while drawing nudes at the academy to my studio and had them pose as the figures I envisioned for my paintings. I soon realised that it was more effective to photograph myself, because I knew, for example, exactly what facial expression a particular figure should have. Also, of course, I was available to myself as a model 24 hours a day, so that at any moment when a new idea came to me, I could set the corresponding implementation in motion by myself. 

In the beginning it all had a certain comedy when only myself appeared in my pictures and I compulsively tried to always accommodate one or two other people. But here, too, I quickly realised that I need not be ashamed of the result of my work, on the contrary. Isn't it a feature of our times that many people are so self-absorbed that they share practically their entire lives on social media and at the same time there is a huge audience that consumes and celebrates this content? So I felt that my approach of exclusively self-portraiture was a fantastic way to combine figurative craft painting and modern zeitgeist, bringing together exactly the two poles that seemed to be at odds with each other in my paintings.

The inspiration for the stories I want to tell in my paintings can be practically any experience of my everyday life, for example songs, conversations with other people or any billboards that evoke associations. To remember all these ideas, I have a little book in which I write down my picture ideas; it's already filled to the brim and I can't keep up with painting! 

The stories I tell in my paintings don't always have to be personal stories, but they often are. This is the case, for example, with my final painting at the art academy, "Adieu". The picture is about the union between traditional and modern understanding of art and about the effort it took me to recognise both concepts of art as equal. What good is it if I just complain about modern art and don't take it upon myself to make a contribution to modern art that I think deserves that title? It is the same in other areas. We must not only complain that beauty is disappearing from, for example, architecture and music, but we must inspire young people to set a corresponding neo-renaissance in motion themselves, even or precisely because the path is arduous. 

A more detailed text on my work 'Adieu' can, however, be found on my website (www.fabianpfleger.de), because I love to write texts to my pictures as well, but they are by no means to be understood as an interpretation aid for others, but only represent my personal interpretation of the respective picture. 

How did you two meet and what are your plans together now?

Matthias Kellermann: We met Fabian last year at the Düsseldorf Academy Tour, where he presented his graduation work "Adieu", among other things. But we had also seen his works at previous tours, Fabian's works stand out unmistakably and significantly from the crowd. We quickly realised that he ticks differently than his fellow students. 

You immediately recognise Fabian's philosophical background and the depth of thought in his works. His way of composing is unique. The choice of self-portrait is not about the artist's self-portrayal, it is just a very skilful form of expression in which Fabian slips into the various roles of the characters portrayed, like an actor. I believe that even if Fabian decides to paint a picture with a female protagonist, for example, this picture would also become unmistakably a Fabian Pfleger. 

In any case, we are already looking forward to his next works, because it is like when new children are born. We plan to present the new works next year in May at Art Karlsruhe in a solo show. However, we already have a list of clients who are just waiting for Fabian Pfleger's latest works to be presented to them. 

May I ask what a Fabian Pfleger costs?

Matthias Kellermann: Well, if you ask me, of course far too little! (laughs). Fabian prices will develop, of course, and the demand is already greater than what Fabian can supply. 

The smaller works and studies currently cost from 3500 euros, the larger and more complex works are correspondingly more expensive. The top end at the moment is probably the monumental work "Adieu" already mentioned, with a wall-filling width of 5.10 metres! This is, of course, a museum piece. We think that "Adieu" really belongs in a museum and sooner or later we will give it away to an appropriate collection. With certain works, a gallery owner has to steer it and this requires patience. It has to be the right collection, you don't give the work away before that. 

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fabianpfleger.de

©Fabian Pfleger