Timo Behn
From the series RHEINGOLD, 2010, bitumen, oil, varnish and acrylic on canvas, 190 x 280 cm
Timo Behn was born 1973 in Jena, Germany. He studied at Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Nürnberg as master student of Ottmar Hörl. Timo Behn lives and works in Berlin.
Timo Behn's works are related to pop art, notably the visual forms of neo dada. This can surely be said of his figurative works, in which the artist likes to make use of mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture. It is also Behn's stylistic bearing that leads to this comparison, such as the reduction of figures and objects to mere outlines, his production of works in series, recurring motives like cans of beer, or the employment of stencils.
Another component in Timo Behn's oeuvre is a connection to the "Neo Geo" movement of the 1980's (short for Neo-Geometric Conceptualism), i.e. to painters such as Peter Halley or Philip Taaffe, whose geometrically-patterned paintings parody early Op Art styles. This is most apparent in the artist's more recent abstract works, such as the series "NeoNeo Paintings", "Das grosse Kreischen" (= The Big Screaming) or "Rheingold". In these, Behn uses garish neon colors and metallic varnish to create angular forms interspersed with colored rays or gold/silver beams. It is an optical game of flat surface and profound depth, of rooms suddenly evolving into outstreched plains.
Timo Behn's works are related to pop art, notably the visual forms of neo dada. This can surely be said of his figurative works, in which the artist likes to make use of mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture. It is also Behn's stylistic bearing that leads to this comparison, such as the reduction of figures and objects to mere outlines, his production of works in series, recurring motives like cans of beer, or the employment of stencils.
Another component in Timo Behn's oeuvre is a connection to the "Neo Geo" movement of the 1980's (short for Neo-Geometric Conceptualism), i.e. to painters such as Peter Halley or Philip Taaffe, whose geometrically-patterned paintings parody early Op Art styles. This is most apparent in the artist's more recent abstract works, such as the series "NeoNeo Paintings", "Das grosse Kreischen" (= The Big Screaming) or "Rheingold". In these, Behn uses garish neon colors and metallic varnish to create angular forms interspersed with colored rays or gold/silver beams. It is an optical game of flat surface and profound depth, of rooms suddenly evolving into outstreched plains.