room for humour

Gerd Fleischmann, Stadttheater Fürth, Fürth, Bavaria, 29.04. – 31.05.2001  

Bretterbericht, 4/2001, Thomas Reher

Gerd Fleischmann

Drawings

Gerd Fleischmann is well known in Fürth and in good memory. Until his death in November 1999, he held the office for cultural affairs, committed, with great love and inimitable humour. Less well known are his drawings and cartoons: Hardly any slip of paper was safe from his sharp pen. Protocols, applications, agendas and other "official papers", he made to the basis of his inspiration, his witty ironic comments and his unlimited imagination.

Gerd Fleischmann plays with the world. He avails himself the reality to develop it further, to write and rework poetry. With the help of his pen he undermined the seriousness of the politics, the dignity of the office and the authority of facts. In the humorous approach to the world man finds to himself - or by Gerd Fleischmann pushed to himself.

The exhibition brings together drawings from various "chambers of the heart" of the artist. Grotesque scenes of the human hubris carried to extremes and alienation hang beside quiet, subtly drawn "food for thoughts", the trenchant wit alongside poetic dream structures. Often it is the pure fun when drawing, when sharpening a situation and playing a practical joke what transmits on the viewer.

The Stadttheater is an ideal venue for this exhibition, because on the one hand - on the official paper - it is a "civic institution", on the other hand a poetic place of boundless imagination.