I am not much of a sculpture lover. Most of the monuments and figures I see, are just nonsense to me. Maybe just ok for their educational or historical context. In museums I tend to walk past them rather fast.

However, there are a few products of sculpting, that literally draw tears from a stone. For instance some of Käthe Kollwitz‘s masterpieces. But this is not today’s topic.

Today’s topic shall be Susanne Kraißer. Another young artist, whose work I saw for the first time at transformart festival two weeks ago

Her figurines of mainly female bodies in all their fragility and strength have a certain quality over and above the obvious impression, a sculpture has on first sight. Like: oh, look, a woman, or a beautiful woman, or a sitting woman too small for reality, too big for an obvious abstraction, or a woman, whose skin is ruffled just so, or, further, a tiny woman forlorn on her pedestal, or a group of small, young women and so forth.

Behind, in front and within all these attributes – which are all true – is another, non-textural quality, that is hard to explain. One can see feelings, is maybe the best way to put it. But not in the way, art sometimes subsumes one emotion in a big gesture or condenses the essence of a certain feeling in paint or stone.

Susanne Kraißer’s work radiates something, I’d call bearing or countenance. As I said above – fragility AND strenght may come in waves from a tiny figurine. A certain tilt in the head or the curve of a neck tells stories of hurt, that produced attitude. The posture itself, the way a spine is formed, a body is positioned, tell about a steely quality that will bend but not break.

Or the group of young girls – looking at them as a group, one can see playfullness, humour and so forth. Looking at them individually, one sees the longing for womanhood, the aloofness of extreme youth, shyness and so forth.

And what I loved best, the artist somwhow managed, to give each of her sculptures a portliness that protects them from being stared at.

Well, in short – I just really liked the work of this artist. Have a look: