Conversations with Gavi
Conversations with Gavi is a body of work consisting of new paintings and some earlier drawings and prints which I produced in my last few years when living in Berlin. The title is about a Scottish friend of mine Gavi who also lives in Berlin. We have known each other for many years. Gavi and I would spend countless hours talking about everything imaginable. He would be the person I would go to when I was down or when I was feeling good, or when I had just arrived back in Berlin after some absence doing something or the other. I knew he would always be around or if not somewhere close.
These paintings are related to the conversations we would have because they are quite indulgent in color and abstraction similar to what Gavi and I would be talking in about. They are not difficult or demanding but simple and entertaining, but also with some deep, stimulating intellectual meaning behind them. These conversations would always get me through hard times, but also just to pass some time, almost like reading a book or indulging in a fascinating film documentary.
Many people ask me why I moved to Berlin, which I did in 1994 at the age of 23, and then again in 2011 when I was aged 40. The question is always difficult to answer because Berlin especially East Berlin is a place where people stereotypically escape from, but strangely enough people of my ilk, artists, rebels, political activists, musicians, and people who basically didn’t fit in to wherever they had come from fled to. These people were basically people from everywhere, congregating in Berlin in the 1990’s after the Fall of the Berlin Wall. And Gavi and I were a couple of the people amongst thousands who just ended up there. These years were extremely formative for me and have basically shaped my personality and my work as an artist.
Gavi and I were two people who just naturally got along well. These paintings, drawings and prints are about an easy type of relationship and a need to help each other out in an envirnment so abrasive as Berlin. They are works which are trying to be fun yet intellectual at the same time, like what happens when a couple of people sit down together and have cup of tea in that type of politically and intellectually charged environment and talk about everything and at the same time talk about nothing.
This show was difficult for me to put together, I’ll have to admit. I returned to Astoria in February 2022 after 10 straight years of living in Berlin. It was sad to leave, but circumstances forced me to return home. These new paintings, prints and drawings I have included in this show are a culmination in one sense or description of those very intense years from 2011 to 2022 spent in Berlin which I could only really define as “Conversation with Gavi”.
Nicholas Knapton
January 2024
Conversations with Gavi is a body of work consisting of new paintings and some earlier drawings and prints which I produced in my last few years when living in Berlin. The title is about a Scottish friend of mine Gavi who also lives in Berlin. We have known each other for many years. Gavi and I would spend countless hours talking about everything imaginable. He would be the person I would go to when I was down or when I was feeling good, or when I had just arrived back in Berlin after some absence doing something or the other. I knew he would always be around or if not somewhere close.
These paintings are related to the conversations we would have because they are quite indulgent in color and abstraction similar to what Gavi and I would be talking in about. They are not difficult or demanding but simple and entertaining, but also with some deep, stimulating intellectual meaning behind them. These conversations would always get me through hard times, but also just to pass some time, almost like reading a book or indulging in a fascinating film documentary.
Many people ask me why I moved to Berlin, which I did in 1994 at the age of 23, and then again in 2011 when I was aged 40. The question is always difficult to answer because Berlin especially East Berlin is a place where people stereotypically escape from, but strangely enough people of my ilk, artists, rebels, political activists, musicians, and people who basically didn’t fit in to wherever they had come from fled to. These people were basically people from everywhere, congregating in Berlin in the 1990’s after the Fall of the Berlin Wall. And Gavi and I were a couple of the people amongst thousands who just ended up there. These years were extremely formative for me and have basically shaped my personality and my work as an artist.
Gavi and I were two people who just naturally got along well. These paintings, drawings and prints are about an easy type of relationship and a need to help each other out in an envirnment so abrasive as Berlin. They are works which are trying to be fun yet intellectual at the same time, like what happens when a couple of people sit down together and have cup of tea in that type of politically and intellectually charged environment and talk about everything and at the same time talk about nothing.
This show was difficult for me to put together, I’ll have to admit. I returned to Astoria in February 2022 after 10 straight years of living in Berlin. It was sad to leave, but circumstances forced me to return home. These new paintings, prints and drawings I have included in this show are a culmination in one sense or description of those very intense years from 2011 to 2022 spent in Berlin which I could only really define as “Conversation with Gavi”.
Nicholas Knapton
January 2024
