Edzard Reuter meets Günther Scharein in Berlin
For some quite entertaining “summit” Edzard Reuter, Günther Scharein and Professor Rott tonight met at Berlin’s KulturKaufhaus Dussmann.
After some introduction by Dussmann’s managing director, journalist and publicist Professor Rott introduced the guests of the night - former Mercedes-Benz chairman of the board and passionate art collector Edzard Reuter and the painter Günther Scharein. Reason for this get together was the opening of the exhibition of paintings by Scharein at the KulturKaufhaus. For this special event, Reuter recited some interesting passages from his book “Der schmale Grat des Lebens - Begegnungen und Begebnisse” (The narrow ridge of life - meetings and situations) which was recently released by Hohenheim publishers, in which some of the meetings and situations he writes about deal with Günther Scharan as the topic.
Günther Scharein, who can be called some pigheaded fellow and contrarian among the painters without being too disrespectful and who cares only about the development of his art without following fashionate trends of the art market, has developed some special technique of painting. He puts upon 17 different dots of different colour on one square centimer, creating surfaces suffused by light. For many years now he is a close friend of Mrs. and Mr. Reuter. Scharein, one of the typical members of the german 1968 student’s movement, has some aversion against the art business, gallery owners and collectors and leastwise against the capital, which is substantiated on the epoch he spent the bigger part of his youth.
So, at first sight, it was some very critical moment, when “hardliner” Günther Scharein and Edzard Reuter, who was one of the main representatives of the big industry at that time, met at first. Nowadays, due to their long lasting friendship, Reuter now even calls him “Schari” from time to time. Different than one might have expected the first meeting worked out quite well, and Günther Scharein recalls from his memories that he was kind of enthusiastic afterwards, because he met a person who visited as the manager of one of the world’s biggest companies, Mercedes-Benz, and in fact being somebody who was on the same wave length as the painter himself. As the painter explained tonight he quite easily recognizes some kindred spirit due to the questions he gets asked. Obviously, on that day, Edzard Reuter had the right questins in his “baggage”.
The talk last night was rich regarding the payoffs as well as some entertaining moments, when for example Professor Rott mentioned that Günther Scharan lives in Berlin instead of someplace where the light for a painter is perfect, like in the Provence: “...there isn’t the perfect light for painting in Berlin”, Edzard Reuter (whose father was mayor of Berlin and who himself is a honorary citizen of Berlin) replied with some remark synonymous to something like “man, you better watch out!”.
Last night at Dussmann we got to know some man, formerly being the head and “captain” of Mercedes-Benz, who is an art collector out of pure passion for the arts, just like his wife who he mentioned several times. The couple collect art because they love to be surrounded by paintings. They don’t plan to build an archive nor a museum one day. Art enrichens their life and that is why they collect art.
Günther Scharein is a painter whose development the Reuters closely follow since many years, which is one of the things a collector should do, said Reuter. Being asked about the much hyped painters of today he said that he can’t comment on them because their art doesn’t talk to him. Replying to Professor Rott’s question if he doesn’t secretly own one of the works by en vogue painters Meese or Richter, he replied that he belongs to the generation of managers who didn’t have those high wages like his successors, which brought some exhilaration to the faces of the members of the audience.
As usual, this Dussmann event was very well frequented which left some of the visitors without a seat. In the public we spotted some well known Berlin faces like Professor Dr. Peter Raue, who is the head of the friends and patrons of the Nationalgalerie.
The exhibition “Scharein - Sinfonie in Gelb”, featuring some of Günther Schareins “colour arrays” can be visited till the 11th of april at the KulturKaufhaus Dussmann, located at Friedrichstraße 60 in Berlin-Mitte. More info about the artist can be found on his website http://www.scharein.de - on the 5th and 15th of march and on the 4th of april, the painter will be present at Dussmann to lead through the exhibition himself. More information on those events as well as the registration can be found on Dussmann’s website http://www.kulturkaufhaus.de
