Nature is the main topic of Ansgar Skiba's artistic work. The special exhibition Ansgar Skiba. Flowers focuses on his flower and garden motifs.
Magnolias, water lilies, tulips, irises or peonies – Skiba knows every flower, knows its flowering time and its characteristics. His knowledge of flowers is extensive – and unusual for an artist. He traces the growth of flowers and studies their specific colours. In his painting he absorbs what he has experienced and seen. Nevertheless, Skiba does not reproduce the flowers, but creates something new. He exaggerates their colours on the canvas to increase the intensity of what he has experienced. The oil paint, which is applied very thickly and partly with his hands, captures the liveliness of nature, its vitality, the play of movement in the wind or of light and shadow.
The exhibition at the Museum für Gartenkunst at Benrath Palace is Skiba’s first solo museum exhibition in Düsseldorf. It comprises about 50 oil paintings, watercolours and silverpoint drawings. (from exhibition flyer)
In this special guided tour, curator Dr Ulrike Lehmann gave us exciting insights into the conception of the exhibition as well as the work of the artist Ansgar Skiba, making art-historical references in the process. Many thanks for that, dear Dr Lehmann. It was a wonderful Sunday excursion in the best autumn weather.