Camping Cézanne
(Maastricht / Mosae Forum 21-37)
In Camping Cézanne Thomas Steiner (1956, Austria) refers to mount Saint Victoire in the South of France. To the painter Paul Cézanne this landscape at the end of the 19th century was an inexhaustible source to convey the universal that be believed was hidden behind the external form. Steiner studies the almost obsessive fascination the artist can have with nature. He combines analogous and digital techniques to render this process and uses sound, a striking addition. As was the case with Cézanne, for Steiner the conceptual as well as visual realities of the landscape are supreme. He shows how landscape artworks capture a myriad of interpretations and vantage points. This video shows a perfect blend of actual and artificial landscape.
This work thematizes the line of fracture that divides nature and culture, the ambivalent characteristic of every built landscape. The many paintings-over slowly unveil the landscape. The multi-facet work oozes the tension between reality and construction.