Game 2022/2023

"Play is a painting whose main character is not actually in the frame at all. There are only a few feathers that suggest the existence of this creature and nothing is known about its fate. Are the feathers a natural product of moulting or have they been forcibly removed? And what role do the small golden-black yellowhammers actually play? Are they perhaps even responsible for the loss of these feathers? After all, the evil that is not depicted is often the most powerful.
Or is it a classic pictorial subject of frolicking, mischievous birds, an expression of joie de vivre and play?
I hope that the possibility of the simultaneity of these two options is contained in the picture, and that beauty is allowed to shimmer and doubt without having to relinquish its beauty. I worked on this picture for a very long time.
(Lukas Janitsch, Artist's statement, January 15, 2023.)