god is in the details....

Christian Eckart. Detail Painting 541. 1991-93. Gold leaf on wood.

Here, at last, the frame has engulfed the painting. Consumed the painting. Become the painting.

In the hands of contemporary artist Christian Eckart, the gold leaf that is traditionally the craft of framers, that traditionally surrounds and contains the art, is the art. 

And in the process, it loses its machine-like perfection. Becomes the imperfections. The flaws. Becomes marked by the maker's hands.

It becomes the details.

Because "god is in the details." (Ludvig Mies Van der Rohe)

where the something becomes everything....

Christian Eckart. One of the Andachtsbild series on the left.
One of the Eidolon series on the right. Gold leaf on wood.

In Christian Eckart's gold works, the frame grows ever wider. From the Eidolons -- gold frames framing nothing -- to the Andachtsbilds, where the nothing is almost gone. Where the something that surrounds it, is everything. Where the something almost negates it. Almost silences it.

Where the void -- the sacred -- is almost lost.

Where the gold that reveals it, almost consumes it.

Christian Eckhart. Two works from the Andachtsbild series. 1993