sketchbooks

petra thalmeier hikes and knows her mountains. she sketches in front of nature, records light and shadow formations, sequences of shapes and geological features in detail in order to realize them artistically in her studio. sketchbook and camera are the most important tools for petra thalmeier, which she takes with her into the mountains.

like the photographer, she chooses the image detail that defines the composition as valid. like the draughtsman, she concentrates on structures and configurations. the point of view necessarily becomes the central moment of her artistic landscape, just as it was the central moment of her aesthetic perception of the environment, of the mountain world.

… and leafing through my sketchbooks allows me to think myself into these landscapes again and again – to tune into them …

for the painter petra thalmeier, drawing in the midst of the mountain world is the most intensive way of seeing. for her, however, drawings are no longer preliminary stages to a picture, as they were seen as such in the 19th century. drawings as preliminary stages – to a certain extent as a predetermined sounding out of weightings and forms that are worked out more precisely per drawing until they lead to a picture – do not exist in her work. because every painting process goes beyond all these preconceived and also circled out pencil thoughts. the setting of colored areas is precisely the considerable difference to the drawing, which can only be a preliminary intermediate stage to the picture.

in addition to insights into numerous touring books, such as the langkofel and brenta sketchbook or the usa sketchbook, you can also see drawn preliminary thoughts for picture series (karwendel cuts or glacier comics) and drawing sequences in single sheet series of high ifen, zugspitz over ammersee, schlern and langkofel cross formats.