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Fragmented Identity: Andy Denzler's blurred and frenzied artworks of distorted moments

The elusive imagery in Andy Denzler’s paintings (featured previously) is not so much the product of what is there, but what is not there. The Swiss artist has developed a signature technique that injects his paintings with an instant subtext, a now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t narrative.

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A figure sitting in a crouched position, fragmented by horizontal streaks of paint and scraped layers, creating a sense of movement and distortion across the composition

"I am not interested in painting pretty pictures. I try to create a certain mood or ambience. It has a lot to do with colour and lighting. It should look dark rather than nice,” says Denzler. Hence men and women who appear pinned to the wall by an unseen centrifugal force; women sitting uneasily on the edges of chairs or on unmade beds; a man and a woman in a decomposing villa.

Denzler, who started out as an abstract painter, uses a Leica camera to take enigmatic pictures of men, women and men and women, in uncertain surroundings. The camera records crisp images, in the smooth, creamy, naturalistic palette that the artist favours.

But unlike many contemporary painters, Denzler doesn’t reproduce the photographic image onto a canvas to create a template for his work. Instead, he paints freehand, using the photograph as a reference, and building up layer upon layer of wet paint. Then, when he has a "perfect painting", he deconstructs it, leaving in its wake traces of what was.

The vestigial image, boldly striped with horizontal scrapes made by a spatula dragged across the canvas, has the effect of a video that has been permanently put on pause, giving the viewer a sense that something came before, and something will come after. But what remains in the present is a single transient, but captive, moment.

“I bring time and motion into the imagery, by using both time and motion. It’s an alla prima technique, painting wet-on-wet; I control the speed of the painting process, because there is a limited amount of time before the canvas dries," Denzler explains. "It's a very radical process."

Fragmented Identity will go on show at Opera Gallery in Monaco from 23 June until 8 July.

A figure in a white shirt stands with distorted, fragmented features created by horizontal scrapes across the canvas, showing Andy Denzler's deconstructive painting technique
Figure in white shirt and black trousers fragmented by horizontal painted stripes, creating a blurred and distorted effect against a muted background
Blurred figures layered across horizontal stripes of paint, creating a fragmented composition of distorted bodies in muted tones with orange accents
Fragmented portrait of a woman with long dark hair, obscured by horizontal streaks of pale paint layered across her figure against a weathered white wall
Painting by Andy Denzler of a shirtless man with head tilted back, obscured by horizontal streaks of pale paint across his torso and legs, standing against a neutral background
Woman in a dark feathered garment standing against a dark background, rendered with horizontal scraping marks that fragmentarily obscure the figure
Fragmented painting of a figure in motion with horizontal striations of orange, white and black obscuring the form, created through layered paint and scraping technique
Abstract oil painting with horizontal streaks of white, pink, grey and black paint layered across the canvas with gestural brushstrokes and spatula marks
Portrait of a woman with long dark hair wearing a pale pink top, fragmented by horizontal streaks of white and grey paint applied across the canvas
A figure in a dark jacket with outstretched arms rendered with horizontal striations and blurred brushstrokes, fragmenting the composition into layered planes of muted tones and gestural marks
A figure with dark hair sits on an unmade bed in a cream-coloured room, their form blurred and partially obscured by horizontal scrape marks across the painted surface
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