Research Interests - Friedhard Kiekeben

Friedhard Kiekeben’s works take form as digital wall drawings, etched metal sculptures, and series of prints. Information and transformation, as well as simulated versus real space are key issues of his abstract art. The work, which is shown internationally, raises fundamental questions of human perception, and it emphasises information as the new paradigm of a contemporary aesthetic.

After the metaphysic of being and appearance, after that of energy and determination, comes that of indeterminacy and the code.
…Today, when the real and the imaginary are confused in the same operational totality, the aesthetic fascination is everywhere.

Jean Baudrillard: ‘Simulations’

Friedhard Kiekeben has taken a lead role in the development of non-toxic printmaking. This scientific investigation is manifested in the invention and development of a range of metal salt and acrylic resist etching processes. The new process-based research findings are disseminated and implemented internationally.

‘But first the notion that man has a body distinct from his soul, is to be expunged; this I shall do by printing in the infernal method by corrosives, … melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying the infinite which was hid. If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.’

William Blake, ‘The marriage of heaven and hell’