Martha Jungwirth Der Reiter, 2021

Martha Jungwirth’s recent works were made during the pandemic, almost like a diary of isolation, and reflect an intimate connection to herself and to the external world. In Der Reiter (2021), the abstracted shape of the rider emerges from the brushstrokes and blotches, coming into existence like a hallucinatory manifestation. Her works achieve a fine balance between abstraction and figuration, between unconscious impressions and ‘a deep awareness of the immeasurableness of reality,’ writes Hans-Peter Wipplinger. Her idiosyncratic, non-conformist approach to painting occupies an intuitive space that exists beyond the formation of recognisable images, ‘before spoken language’, ‘before memory’ and ‘before the obtrusiveness of objects’. The reduced pictorial language of Der Reiter brings to mind this preverbal world and the first lines drawn in cave paintings, acknowledging ties with the origins of art.