Why does it feel so familiar looking at Lina Sommer’s work cycle? A canny familiarity. But why is it so difficult to pin point? Her work thrives from this strange in-between-moment of unutterable awareness of its language. The space filling sheets of paper are reworked with China ink and watercolor using various tools such as sponges, pipettes and brushes while traces of water are used as a first sketch or drawing of what is going to happen. Her works are lively surfaces that expand beyond their given flatness into obscure valleys, mountains and plains. Little tears in the pigment look like precise lines, resembling topographic formations or dried out leather. Through the layered working process each new application of color becomes an experiment of unexpected results and details that are to be explored within these immersive structures.
Sommer follows a distinct narrative approach in her artistic process, each show bringing to light a new story or cycle as she would call it. Here in the installation, lines of color overlap and trespass from one sheet to another while the imagery grows in size and volume, giving an idea of a beginning and an end. But what’s the story to be told?
“2 – 1 – 0” is best understood, or comprehended by an emotional approach. Each of its pieces plays with a strong contrast of light and shadow, color and paper. But there is also the minuscule ones evoking emotional responses. While Sommer plays with themes like permeance, diffluence, flow, wet and dry, she catches more then just the rhythm of herself working, more then just a play with colors. The blue one strangely feels like the sky, even though it does not look like it. The black one like a cold winter evening, but it is too bright. The green and red one like a walk through a forest in the summer time, but there are no trees. Sommer’s work contains a deep lyrical energy, that she channels onto the paper. A strange and refreshing contrast for a painterly working habit.