Dieter Schwarz on ERNST CARAMELLE, das gleiche, aber anders, 2026

ERNST CARAMELLE das gleiche, aber anders 21 MAY – 27 JUN 2026 Grünangergasse 1 I Vienna “All of a sudden, one thing is several things at once”: This poignant observation about Ernst Caramelle’s work was made by the art theorist Denys Zacharopoulos. Perhaps also one picture is several pictures, one title several titles, and one concept several concepts all at once? Where are the boundaries between reality and illusion, between original and copy? The handling of deception and what seems real — exploring what is “visible” — is a through line in Caramelle’s entire work and is based on the idea that “art is a fake,” which is also the title of one of his works from 1977. But when is art a fake? The viewpoints in Caramelle’s works are never clear; sometimes they are ambivalent, or often ambiguous regarding the perspectives in his pictorial spaces and in terms of cultural-historical spaces and their narratives – where temporal levels are inserted and works are complemented by language in the form of short comments, which are not explanations, but ironic remarks that undermine the themes of the works as such. Freedom of language and an automatism in the process of creation appear to be self-evident characteristics for the artist. They can be used as a guide to looking at the works and recognizing the references in the pictures, or we can also add our own. “Showing the same thing in a way that it is always different” is something that Caramelle said in 1979. It means that everything is already present but can always be seen and interpreted in a new fashion. In his current exhibition “das gleiche, aber anders” (the same, but different), which is also his tenth solo show in the gallery, the artist follows the same principles. Here, Caramelle opens up several levels of new spaces that not only extend beyond conventions, but also challenge our expectations in sophisticated ways. He thus establishes a connection to a poetic idea iterated by Oswald Oberhuber, who was his teacher at the art academy: “Art is the internal entrance to the unknown.”