Dick Berckenkamp

In Spritz II from the Radio Spritz series, Dick Berckenkamp radicalizes the dialogue between impulse and structure. The work captures a frequency that appears even denser and more multi-layered than in previous works. Here too, the artist remains true to his intention: the canvas was worked on while lying flat and from all sides, resulting in a composition that knows no fixed point of rest but remains in a constant, circling motion.

A striking comparison can be drawn here to the works of Albert Oehlen. Like Oehlen, Berckenkamp uses painting as a field for “sampling” visual information. It is no longer about the one, sacred gesture, but about the conscious layering of different energy states. In Spritz II, the coarse, graphic traces of spray paint meet rhythmic acrylic gradients. This deliberate heterogeneity of means is a core characteristic of post-abstraction and lends the work a visual friction that permanently challenges the viewer’s eye.

The image functions like a radio turned up high, in which different signals overlap. The colors – a vibrating interplay of yellow and orange tones, interrupted by cool accents – act like energetic waves measuring the pictorial space. Berckenkamp deliberately avoids static color surfaces and relies on the dynamic interlocking of media, creating a depth that is not perspective but atmospheric.

The conscious decision to leave large parts of the light ground open acts as an active light element, allowing the colors to stand as pure frequencies in space. Ultimately, Spritz II becomes a visual score of the intangible. Because the image was painted from all sides, there is no “correct” view – the work forces the viewer to remain in motion themselves and to constantly rediscover the balance between the wild application of color and the rhythmic order.