#eoin llewellyn

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Forever In Another World by Caudal from the album Forever In Another World [Free Download/Name Your Price on BandCamp]

[magictransistor]

Eoin Llewellyn (after Caspar David Friedrich), Krina by the Sea, 2011.

[artstarstv]

The New Berlin Painters: Exhibition 3

Above, The New Berlin Painters in Berlin, September 2013. Photos by Nadja Sayej. By Nadja Sayej When they first hit the art scene, everyone thought they were one-hit wonders. Three shows later, they're backed by critics, have representation, sales and sponsorship, not to mention museum and media partnerships. The infamous art collective return for their third exhibition armed with a new painter to their collective, an opening party at Forum Factory on October 10, new works, a new attitude, a new limited-edition newspaper and a late-night party (RSVP here). The New Berlin Painters consists of American painter Paul Vogeler, best known for his ghostly portraits of unknown war figures and birch-friendly birds, while German painter (and rapper) Moritz Hoffmann (a.k.a. Dr. Moe from Schwip Schwapp) creates raw, charcoal scenes draped with moody dictators and political figures. The newest addition to the collective, Irish painter Eoin Llewellyn paints high realist, almost vintage portraiture, starring a peculiar, otherworldly cast. Last year, the collective made waves with their anti-conceptual, balls-busting manifesto, which garnered a thundering response from the international art world, including words from the influential New York art critic, Jerry Saltz. And yet, one of their supporters still says, “manifestos are only as good as the paper they’re written on.” On a rainy Berlin afternoon, the group gathered at Café Gaudy to chat about stardom, their haters and what it takes to make good painting.

From left, The New Berlin Painters: Eoin Llewellyn, Moritz Hoffmann and Paul Vogeler. What do you have to say to all the people who hate you? Moritz: They can suck my dick. I don’t care. They should keep hating. They should hate more and should have more passion in their hatred. Paul: If you hate us, you should come to our show and tell us why you hate it so much. Moritz: And buy ten paintings and burn them in front of me. I’ll burn the money in front of you. And then for everyone, there’s a big party. Paul: We’re really just three guys putting our paintings in a show.

Above, artist Paul Vogeler. Below, painting by Vogeler, Escape (2013). Doing side projects like The New Berlin Papers helped you gain representation with Galerie Albrecht and support. What is the motive behind the Papers? Paul: The motive was to create a dialogue that is not necessarily what people want to hear. We bring issues important for our generation and future generations. We reached out to people who are like-minded and invited them to write some of the issues we are dealing with today – the craziness of the art market, paying $500,000 for an art education, the role of the curator being more important than the artist these days, the list is endless. The paper, we discuss things. Moritz: We give people an option to write something, it’s open for everybody to join to write. Look at the article by RM Vaughan in the new papers, he criticizes us and that’s cool. Paul: If you’re against us, we’d love to print that too. People are talking and have opinions and it is okay to have opinions that go against the art world and that was the idea behind it. Eoin: I think there’s something interesting in exposing yourself in a world that is deeply veiled and has a lot of fears in it, not being afraid of that. Most artists are cooped up in their studios, most careerists in the art world are also in their own world – fashion, dance – everyone is striving to get a small piece of something. I think it’s important to return back to the basis of why anybody got into this. When you were a kid, you were interesting in painting! I was interested in the guys because they brought that back again, I thought, I like what they’re doing and I would like to stand for that.

Above, artist Eoin Llewellyn. Below, painting by Llewellyn, The Last Flight (2011). Your newest collective member is Eoin Llewellyn, an Irish high-realist painter who runs Cafe Gaudy in Prenzlauer Berg. How did you get to know each other? Paul: It was a night like last night when I couldn’t sleep… (laughs) but it was too cold to go to the bar and I found Eoin on the internet and I needed to learn some new and old techniques. Eoin knows a lot about techniques so we emailed and hooked up and I started taking classes, he was my teacher. Eoin: He came in, like any student, I teach individually. He came into my class, showed me the Papers and I thought ‘I know you, I remember reading this manifesto a year ago.’ I remember reading it online, there was a few things I wasn’t mad about but there were other things I thought ‘this is a lot of balls and fair due to them, I like people going against the grain.’

Above, artist and rapper Moritz Hoffmann. Below, painting by Hoffmann entitled Street Scene (2012). It has been over a year since the NBP began. What are you, a gang, a collective, a theory? Eoin: In my opinion, a theory. Paul: We are a group of artists, so we are a collective but we’re a theory too because we’ve stated our point in what we are trying to make. But we’re also a gang because Moritz is a rapper. We have lots of guns, be careful haters. Moritz: We got the Jewish rap gang. Does The New Berlin Painters manifesto still apply? Eoin: When something is written down, it becomes very powerful. It has huge effects. Moritz: It becomes its own thing because it’s written down. And it’s up to the reader of how they interpret it. Paul: With the manifesto, it depends on what you want to do with it. It was a good manifesto, it influenced a lot of people and we’re still behind it. We still get emails from artists who want to contribute; I still think we’re making waves.

Do you want to be famous? Paul: I think we already are famous. Moritz: Stupid question! We already are famous, Mrs. Interviewer. Eoin: I have no interest in being famous. I have an interest in making beautiful works that stand alongside things from old time, from 500 years till now. Paul: I think being respected is more important than being famous. This is not for fame, this is for us. Moritz: We’re trying to achieve something, to make our own stuff, if it doesn’t work out, we tried it.

The New Berlin Painters: Exhibition 3 runs from October 8-13, 2013. Opening: Thursday, October 10, 18h-23h. Forum Factory, Besselstrasse 13-14, 10969 Berlin, Germany. RSVP here.

[70years]

Eoin Llewellyn