‘Alle Vöglein sind schon da, alle Vöglein, alle!’

CALLICOON, NY — Callicoon Fine Arts will open an exhibition of 20 German artists titled “Alle Vöglein sind schon da, alle Vöglein, alle!” with a reception on Saturday, October 31 from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. The exhibition was suggested and titled by painter André Butzer, and with the special assistance of artists Thomas Winkler and Ulrich Wulff. Some of the artists, though they may have lively resumes listing exhibitions in Europe, have never before shown work in the United States. The gallery is located at 27 Lower Main Street, upstairs.

The title of the exhibition is borrowed from the first line of a German children’s folk song, which announces the beginning of spring with the line, “All the little birds are already here, all the little birds, all!” Coming in the middle of autumn, the title’s announcement of spring is either too early or too late, but the pastoral aspects of the song easily fit the rural setting of Callicoon.

While the artworks in the exhibition deploy a variety of conceptual approaches and styles, the dominant mode represented here is abstract painting. For example, the action paintings of Butzer, with reference to Disney characters and personages in German history, use a variety of stylistic improvisations in an unsettling mixture of irony and sincerity, lost-in-outer-space distortion. In the paintings of Winkler, what appear to be statements of De Stijl purity are actually derivations of multi-holed frame mats that are commonly used to display family photographs, or in his case, photo-documents of his performances as Professor Winkler.

For more information visit callicoonfinearts.com or call 845/887-4202.