For the established ecclesiastical project Sichtweisen 2020, in which art, music and word come together in the context of the Passion Time, the Protestant church community of Friedberg was able to win the Armenian-Lebanese artist Jean Boghossian for an exhibition of his works and present these works under the title ‘Feuerspuren’ (Traces of Fire).
Boghossian’s paintings experiment with fire and smoke on canvas. He tries to order the destructive power of fire in his paintings, to give it a structure, sometimes even a harmony.
The motifs of fire, ashes and smoke in the works of Jean Boghossian are to be made fruitful for the themes of the Passion period in the Friedberg Castle Church. Suffering and loss, transience and mortality, transformation, life and resurrection power are to be connected and considered with his works from a theological perspective.
Boghossian is an internationally acclaimed artist. Among other things, he was represented at the 57th Venice Biennale in 2017 and designed the Armenian pavilion. His biography is determined by his flight from the Armenian genocide. His parents fled to Aleppo, Syria, in 1915. Jean Boghossian was born there in 1949. Later the family found a new home in Beirut. The artist himself now lives in Belgium.
The event series “Views on Passion” has been running in Friedberg since 2002, linking contemporary art and thoughts on Passion. In 5 devotions, which take place on Thursdays at 7 pm, thoughts on suffering and the experience of suffering in this world as well as the experience of Christ’s cross are interpreted in this context by means of artistic positions.
The exhibition was supported by the EKHN Foundation, the Hessian Ministry of Science and Art, the Protestant Deanery of Wetterau, the OVAG and the Gallery Hoffmann, among others.
(source : Joachim Albert)