My time at the Silvretta Atelier in Montafon was a dramatic contrast to my urban-based studio practice in Berlin. The vast distances, heights, and dynamically changing environment were exciting, but also challenging to respond to. I hiked up into the forest, observing shifting environments as I ascended to the top of the mountain. I loved the extremes of this location – the bright green lichen patterns against cold grey stone, flowing streams which evaporated into white, moving clouds, and the sun exploding in the sky – as opposed to Berlin’s more static weather. Mornings at the atelier were often blanketed in fog, and the bird calls and ringing cowbells in the distance gave a mystical feeling.
However, not all was an idyllic experience. The mountainside was criss-crossed by cables, fallen lumber, hidden maintenance roads, and strategically placed sentinels of snow cannons. Nature has been actively tamed, modified, and harvested.
As I hiked, land rose steeply and fell dramatically into ravines. Ghost-like stumps haunted the mountainside, and remnants of cleared lumber jutted out of the earth. Roots twisted and crawled through mud and rocks, visited by black salamanders. Sunny hikes offered different experiences: buzzing holes slowly launching drowsy bumblebees, their hive hidden in a mix of sand and bleached white dead tree branches. Higher up, butterflies landed in blueberry patches that gave way to grassy rocks.
After returning to my Berlin studio, I reflected on the sensory experiences of Montofon. I developed larger paintings, transferring the energy, movement, surfaces, forms, color, and stratification of the mountainside into built up layers of paint, fabric, and sand. Each work is a kind of “inner-landscape” of compressed experience.
Michael Markwick