As a student at the Academy of Visual Arts, Leipzig, I was a regular in the etching workshop. At this printing workshops I got excellent technical training and at the same time a deep understanding of the potential of graphic art. Etching had a strong impact on the technical side of my drawings but also on my philosophy.

 

For me, making pictures is a performative process of cognition in the sense of Bakhtin. The Russian philosopher and literary theorist Mikhail Bakhtin speaks of a "grotesque realism" that puts the marginalized at the center of events. While classical realism represents reality as it should be according to the norms of a cultural order, grotesque realism shows reality as it exists despite this order.

For centuries grotesque realism was found primarily in small graphic works (think of Goyas phantastic series of etchings). I showed it openly in my huge scale drawings.

 

But when I was living in Israel I kept going and coming back and forth to Berlin for professional reasons. I then rediscovered my passion for graphic art; this time for practical reason - those works can travel with me.

 

Linocut proved to be the most practical way of working 'on the road' and the same time it challenged me to work in color blocks instead of lines.