Neues Glas - No. 1/2020
Movement and transformation are central concepts in understanding the work of Heike Brachlow. Others are color, the beauty of geometric forms and their derivations, as well as the playful approach, which makes viewers to actors. It is about transition from one state to another. Clear, transparent colors vary in value depending on the thickness of the cast works. Polychromatic glass completely changes its hue under various sources of light, as if we were looking at completely different objects. Viewers can set many of Brachlow’s works in motion: They sway from side to side, swing back and forth, rotate on their own axis, so that we become anxious about the physical integrity of the artworks that are apparently just about to fall or crash together. They often come to a standstill in a different position than the one from which they were activated. Color elements can be arranged in rows or towers: With the changing constellations, the individual colors overlap in continually new arrangements and thus new color mixtures emerge when we look through the works. In the same way that the role of the normally passive viewer becomes that of an actor making the complexity of the works come alive, thus Brachlow’s own role is multifaceted. It vacillates between making her artistic work and exploring her materials.
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