A Conversation with Gregor Stehle

Mr. Stehle, many artists talk about inspiration. How does a painting begin for you?

With a blank sheet of paper.

That may sound simple, but it is perhaps the most important part of my work. In the morning, a white sheet hangs on the wall. It stays with me throughout the day, sometimes for days or weeks. I don't see it as a problem to solve, but as a presence.

I don't enter the studio thinking that I have to make a picture today. There is no plan, subject, or sketch. The sheet remains open. Sometimes it remains blank.

Emptiness seems to play an important role in your work.

Yes. Emptiness is not the state before the picture. It is part of the picture.

In our culture, emptiness is often understood as a lack. In Asian painting and the Zen tradition, it has a different quality: a space of possibility, where something can emerge.

I'm not interested in filling the surface. I'm interested in what happens between things.

Your works have no titles, only dates. Why?

Because a date is honest.

A title often creates an expectation. It directs the gaze. A date simply says: this sheet came into being on this day.

People often ask what a particular picture means. Usually, I can't give a definitive answer. A picture is not a riddle with a solution. It is a trace of a day.

That's why the series is called TAGE UND ZEICHEN.

You once said, “Other people keep diaries. I paint.”

That describes my work quite well.

A diary records events. My pictures don't record anything. Yet they have something to do with time. They emerge from a particular day, mood, perception, and attention—not as an image of the day, but as a trace of its presence.

Many viewers find your work meditative. Is Zen the key to understanding it?

No. Zen doesn't explain the pictures.

The ten years I lived in a Zen monastery were not an artistic method. They changed the way I see, and perhaps the way I work. But Zen doesn't provide a visual language.

When painting, I try to let go of preconceived ideas. It isn't about expressing something special. It's about paying attention.

How does that attention appear in your working process?

Above all, in waiting.

Many people imagine art emerging through activity. For me, much of the work consists of doing nothing. I sit in front of a sheet. Look. Walk away. Come back. Days can pass.

Then a moment comes when it becomes clear: now. The actual painting often takes only a few minutes.

You use acrylic paint, wax crayons, tape, and simple materials. Why?

Because I'm interested in direct materials.

I'm not looking for perfection. I'm interested in traces. A wax crayon can have exactly the right quality. So can tape. Sometimes a scratch in the paint says more than an elaborate form.

The materials shouldn't impress. They should be allowed to act.

Gallery owner Carsten Lehmann coined the term “attractoral art.” What does it mean to you?

When I first heard the term, I was surprised. At the same time, I recognized something in it.

A single line, a patch of color, or a small form never stands alone on the surface. They enter into relationships, create tension, and draw attention.

Space doesn't arise through perspective or composition in the conventional sense. It arises through relationships. Perhaps that is precisely the dynamic the term describes.

So space is central to your work?

Yes. Space interests me more than form.

For me, a picture is not a window onto the world. It is a space that opens between elements: between color and emptiness, proximity and distance, picture and viewer.

That's why even small interventions can change the entire effect.

Are there philosophical influences on your work?

Of course I read philosophy. I'm interested in thinkers such as Heidegger, François Jullien, and Hermann Schmitz. Peter Sloterdijk has also occupied my thoughts.

But these thoughts don't arise while I'm painting. Philosophy helps me reflect on experiences that have already happened. The picture comes first. Theory comes afterward.

Where would you place your work in art history?

That's difficult to answer.

I feel connected to Chinese painting because emptiness is active there. Art Brut interests me for its immediacy, and Arte Povera for its simplicity of means.

Artists such as Rothko and Twombly have accompanied me, too.

At the same time, I don't try to belong anywhere. Every serious artistic practice ultimately has to find its own way.

What makes a picture successful for you?

That it remains open.

A picture succeeds for me when it doesn't need explaining, when it develops a presence of its own, when you can stand before it and sense that something is happening without immediately being able to name it.

What do you wish for people who look at your work?

Time. Nothing more.

We live in a world where images are usually consumed very quickly. My work functions differently. It doesn't require an extensive background in art history, but it does require attention.

Anyone willing to linger a little longer often discovers things that remain hidden at first glance.

What is art to you?

Perhaps a form of encounter.

Not between artist and audience, but between human beings and the world.

A picture doesn't have to prove or explain anything. It can simply be there.

Sometimes a single line is enough to open a space.

And sometimes that space is enough.