Ralf Rduch creates large-sized nude paintings. His only motif is the human being who is posing nude exclusively. By abandoning clothing his cultural background, social status and that what he wants to represent most is not apparent. Clothing implies pretending – the body itself though will never be a feint.
This concentration on the individual is yet intensified by the fact that the posing characters are positioned in a free space. There is no spatiality, no tangible reality, mostly only some monochrome space, in front of which they are arranged – stage-like- and illuminated from above on the right.
By the concurrence of extreme light- and shadow sections, the bodies have a very vivid appearance. The individual is not a homogeneous creature but he consists of layers and fractures, of manifests and secrets or clandestine emotions.
Ralf Rduch therefore composes arrangements of individuals originating from separate floors - he is segmenting them by eleven tonal values, each one having a shade of color of its own.
Here, the full scope of tonal value is presented ranging from black to white.
To the artist, twelve is the figure of truth, eleven the will to approach the truth.
The eleven shades thus represent the wish to achieve awareness on one hand, but also the knowledge that this is impossible after all. However, there is one feasible approach!
The twelveth color is present in the painting – it is the background color...
It is Ralf Rduch’s intention to paint the invisible, inner processes of individuals.
What are individuals composed of, why are they active or passive?
At the beginning there is an idea and subsequently the compositional layout is determined by sketches and drafts. The next step is the glance into the photo archive or taking photos of some models. After that several photos are mixed and matched. When doing sketches on the canvas, those tones are defined by separation which are required for the layer composition of the bodies. Sometimes the defining of the eleven tones may take several days.
Only at the very end the background is chosen. The figures created this way seem to be very defined, three-dimensional and real at a distance. But the shorter the distance, the more they dissolve – turning intonon-objective, seemingly organic blurs.
This concentration on the individual is yet intensified by the fact that the posing characters are positioned in a free space. There is no spatiality, no tangible reality, mostly only some monochrome space, in front of which they are arranged – stage-like- and illuminated from above on the right.
By the concurrence of extreme light- and shadow sections, the bodies have a very vivid appearance. The individual is not a homogeneous creature but he consists of layers and fractures, of manifests and secrets or clandestine emotions.
Ralf Rduch therefore composes arrangements of individuals originating from separate floors - he is segmenting them by eleven tonal values, each one having a shade of color of its own.
Here, the full scope of tonal value is presented ranging from black to white.
To the artist, twelve is the figure of truth, eleven the will to approach the truth.
The eleven shades thus represent the wish to achieve awareness on one hand, but also the knowledge that this is impossible after all. However, there is one feasible approach!
The twelveth color is present in the painting – it is the background color...
It is Ralf Rduch’s intention to paint the invisible, inner processes of individuals.
What are individuals composed of, why are they active or passive?
At the beginning there is an idea and subsequently the compositional layout is determined by sketches and drafts. The next step is the glance into the photo archive or taking photos of some models. After that several photos are mixed and matched. When doing sketches on the canvas, those tones are defined by separation which are required for the layer composition of the bodies. Sometimes the defining of the eleven tones may take several days.
Only at the very end the background is chosen. The figures created this way seem to be very defined, three-dimensional and real at a distance. But the shorter the distance, the more they dissolve – turning intonon-objective, seemingly organic blurs.
1961 - Born in Bielefeld / Westfalia, Germany
1983 - 84 Set design assistant for the Westfalia studio theatre, Paderborn, Germany
1983 - 85 College of further education for the arts, Bielefeld, Germany
1985 - 87 University for visual communication, Bielefeld, Germany
since 1987 Active as freelance artist in Paderborn, Germany
since 1989 Member of the association of fine arts (BBK)
1995 Scholarship of the town of Wernigerode, Germany
Received `Price for art´ of the town of Emden, Germany
2000 Working scholarship in Ansbach, Germany
2002 Short term scholarship Haus Rissen, Hamburg, Germany
`Invité´, guest of ARTéNIM, Nîmes, France
2005 Scholarship Künstlerbahnhof, Bad Münster am Stein - Ebernburg, Germany
