In the late ’80s and early ’90s, Charline von Heyl lived in Düsseldorf, Germany. She was showing her paintings, however, in Cologne, where the scene was dominated by Martin Kippenberger, Albert Oehlen and others. They shared a refusal to create a signature style, an embrace of “bad” technique and a loathing of Neo-Expressionism. As this show of Von Heyl’s compositions from the period demonstrates, these ideas found their way into her work.
Nowadays, Von Heyl is known for her eclecticism, but her early paintings show a more consistent approach. Each of the six large canvases here pile up abstract forms and images brushed, sprayed and slathered on in hot and cool colors, earth tones and metallic tints. Flat emblems interrupt painterly fields; patterns trail off while references
to Cubism, Surrealism, Polke, Picabia and graffiti mix it up.
In one painting, executed in rich browns, pale blues, soft grays and deep yellows, a horse’s behind merges into an elaborate nest of curvilinear shapes, with a flurry of strokes floating above. In another, a stylized figure carrying two buckets occupies the center of a vortex of blues and greens. In a third, black and blue patterns resembling nets or fish scales swirl around a white, green and terra-cotta cartouche that would serve nicely as a logo.
These collisions are in marked contrast to the layering of Von Heyl’s later paintings; while her new works hold you at a distance, these scrappier, scruffier creations pull you in and then spit you out, dizzy but elated.—Anne Doran