Hubert Scheibl – Babylon

At long last, an exhibition by Austrian painter Hubert Scheibl is being shown at Galerie Kornfeld in Berlin. For this occasion, a selection of works encompassing oil paintings, works on paper and sculptural elements is presented, offering insight into the artist’s multifaceted practice.

Hubert Scheibl (b. 1952, Gmunden, Austria) employs coating knives, palette knives and other tools to create his large-scale abstract paintings. On a visual level, his works are characterized by a distinctive and deeply affecting chromatic universe. Emotionally, they convey pathos through a complex dynamism of spatial structure. The compositions appear to be permeated by an intimate light that floods the pictorial plane, alluding to a deeper space and acting as a sublime source of emotional engagement for the viewer.

Intense, powerful canvases are counterbalanced by delicate, almost sketch-like works, in which idyllic stillness is gently animated by the sporadic presence of radiant colour. Although Scheibl’s paintings often evoke landscapes, none of his works aims to depict the visible world.

Hubert Scheibl is one of the most prominent contemporary painters from Austria. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna under Arnulf Rainer, and in the 1980s was among the most important representatives of a painterly abstraction movement regarded as a significant reaction to Neo-Expressionism.

Scheibl’s work has been presented in international exhibitions since the 1980s, most recently at the Museum der Bildenden Künste Leipzig and the Museum der Moderne Salzburg. His works are held in major collections worldwide, including the Albertina in Vienna and the collection of the Austrian National Bank.

The artist lives and works in Vienna.