Tom Chamberlain

Tom Chamberlain’s artistic works tread a fine line between visibility and invisibility. The Schering Stiftung Collection includes two of his works from 2008 and 2010, which reflect his minimalist and technically meticulous working method.

The untitled drawing from 2008 consists of innumerable pinpricks set regularly on a sheet of paper. Because of the perforations, the surface’s materiality changes: The rather thin, permeable paper undulates and bulges irregularly. The work plays with light and shadow and produces a needle drawing that becomes visible and yet elusive to the eye.

In his work dating from 2010, Chamberlain covers a large sheet of paper with vertical, horizontal, and criss-crossing lines in different color pencil tones. From a distance, the individual lines are hardly recognizable, while upon closer view, the different colors blend into grey.

Chamberlain’s works evolve from a process that is as subtle as it is conceptual. The image refuses to be unambiguously and uniformly visible and definable, ultimately manifesting itself only through the viewer’s subjective experience and when viewed up close.