A group of blank figures contemplate an unfinished bridge. Or is the bridge a finished work of art? (The Bridge, 2000) A boy sleeps in a car-like bed stranded on top of a mountain, at its bottom lie spare parts arranged like sacred gifts (The Mountains, 2000). Angels ascend above a fountain on the moon. But where to? (The Moon, 2003).
The subject matter of Simon Aeschbacher's paintings is never a straight forward affair. Scenes of theatrical ambiguity force you to create your own narrative. They often evoke accidents. Something could go wrong or just has, and yet these scenes don't cause panic, just puzzlement. One even feels calm and an odd sense of being in save hands until a moment later an underlying threat emerges. This constant mood shift may partly explain the term 'transportation' in the show's title. Nothing is as it first appears.

The cycle, produced between 1998 and 2003 in London, where the Swiss-born artist lives and works, consists of twelve paintings in two halves. It's his most ambitious project so far. The scope, as the title suggests, is a daunting one. Sources range from religious and romantic imagery to toy catalogues and works of other painters such as Giotto, Friedrich and Klee. In this shadowy pool of references saints meet dinosaurs (The Plateau, 2002), mountains turn to sand and bleed (The Mountains, 2000), a model train falls asleep on its way to the concentration camp (The Valley, 2000/01). All compositions are carefully arranged. Combined with a deadpan illustration-like look the suggestive playfulness wants to be taken seriously.

A reoccurring theme seems to be nature and the loss of it. Landscapes produced from a detached viewpoint appear displaced and artificial. All that is left of nature are manufactured fragments and a borrowed yearning for something more real. The places here have no names. Nature in them exists only as the product of an urban concept or as echoes from the past. These pretended places are inhabited by toy-like creatures in incomprehensible situations which often refer to something outside the view. One feels that the paintings are meant to inform each another.
It's a haunting group of works. There's a delicate beauty and formal stiffness about much of the imagery that only heightens the sense of unease. One of the most intriguing aspects is their mix of simplicity and refined ingenuity. All the detailed scenes show similarly bewildered figures - that may or may not stand in for the artist - that remind us how the same can have a multitude of meanings.
Aeschbacher's vivid paintings lure one into their ambiguous, melancholy world.
Sam Tobbleron 22-10-03