Getting to the bottom of colour - Matthias Bleyl

An accurate identification of colour in Frank Piasta's paintings is hardly possible, since they display mixed tones, caused by multiple layers of semi-transparent colours. However, the colours as such do not blend. The paint is preferably applied in a semi-mechanical manner by spreading a nearly transparent silicone composition, dyed by the artist, onto a suitable carrier plate. He works in a sphere of tension between transparency and opaqueness of colour. Each new layer is always influenced in its effect by the underlying colour for which its tendency to be transparent is the key prerequisite.

The possibilities are therefore virtually endless, as there are always several factors involved. Firstly, there is the carrier, which can be either a white or a coloured disk. It may even be transparent or consist of reflective metal. Then there are coloured layers, which may once again change the effect of the final colour. Depending on the thickness of a layer the underlying layers are covered. However, due to the semi-transparency of the colour, coverage is never total. Each layer plays a part in the overall impression.

Frank Piasta explores the qualities of colour resulting from its semi-transparency in that the semi-mechanical application can only be controlled to a certain extent and the end result can hardly be predicted accurately. Rather than being determined by the process of application the effect is achieved by selecting and combining resources and individual steps, over which the painter does have control, as opposed to the impact of the finished work.

A white background provides a bright neutral base for colour applications, whereas a coloured one is simply a predetermined monochrome layer of colour, which is pivotal for all subsequent layers.
A transparent carrier on a white wall creates a diffuse colour effect, because the layer of colour casts a shadow on the wall, albeit of moderate density, thereby reducing its brightness. This causes the colour to look duller.
Similarly, between slanted glass panes and wall Frank Piasta's coloured agglomerates cast their own shadow on it thereby causing an ambiguous positioning of the colour phenomenon. A metallic carrier on the other hand reflects the light, which penetrates through the semi-transparent layer of colour like a mirror and makes its presence known by increasing the intensity of the colour.

The use of mirrors - be they aluminium coated glass panes or anodized aluminium plates - fundamentally (and quite literally) changes the character of colour. Contrary to any coloured base a reflecting surface has no inherent colour in the proper sense.
A uniform and thus monochrome white base reflects and scatters the light, which penetrates the semi-transparent layer of paint. This light has an in-depth effect on the colour. Any watercolour painting works in accordance with this principle.
A metal plate may also be uniformly coloured - brass is yellowish, copper reddish, aluminium silver - but, depending on the extent of the reflection of the colour, the intrinsic colour of the metal loses its effect. Instead, light and colour of the environment are mirrored, perhaps as much as or near to 100 %. Aluminium has a silvery effect and usually replaces the easily oxidizing silver in mirror production, but due to its highly reflective properties it practically loses its own monochrome colour, because it reflects the colours of the surrounding space and the objects contained therein almost undistorted. Only gold-coloured reflectors are communicating their warmth to another colour. It is the essence of reflection, that the reflector has no "self" besides mirroring anything other than itself. This applies to a complex mirror image as much as, essentially, to a simple echo. Here, a reflector that throws back the sound waves, such as a rock wall, does not in itself make a sound. While the rock itself is inaudible, the mirror reflecting light waves is virtually invisible.

Even in earlier times did the hall of mirrors in baroque castles play with the possibility of allowing the viewer to look beyond the wall into rooms that appeared to be real. Of course, the interior was only mirrored, while, from the perspective of the deluded viewer, the reflecting surface disappeared. The mirror unfolds its illusory effect only because its inherent monochrome colour is not visible. The mirror seems to be essentially non-existent.
In the 1960s some artists of the American Minimal Art (Robert Morris, Robert Smithson) and the Italian Arte Povera (especially Michelangelo Pistoletto) started using the possibilities employed earlier in the Baroque period of real and perceived dimensionality as well as those of the conscious perception of the viewer. Around that same time representatives of the ZERO movement (Hermann Goepfert, Heinz Mack) used reflective surfaces for the thematization of real light. However, only more recently and just occasionally have metallic surfaces started to appear as carriers of colour inspired by oil paintings mounted on copper plates dating back to the 17th century. But whilst these colour plates were mostly small-scale and valued for their strength but with little material colour effect, today the inherent colour of reflective aluminium surfaces is consciously sought and used to influence the colour appearance.

By applying the paint to reflective surfaces, Frank Piasta is quite literally getting to the bottom of painting. While the mirror is potentially invisible and appears only after marking its surface - often a mere fingerprint suffices - the applied colour actually makes it visible by, as it were, obscuring it. If the colour has been applied thinly enough, even in multiple layers, the surrounding colours, however vague, will influence the colour perception of the paintings to a varying degree and change them. An "objective" colour effect is therefore, by definition, impossible when using a reflective carrier for, even without such carrier, a description of "objective colour" would always be inadequate. The colour of the opposite wall, the light appearing in a window, or the clothing of an observer in front of the painting will be integrated partially and temporarily as a mirror image by the colour of the painting. The effect will disappear or change as circumstances change. This lends the painting a presence and dimension, which only exists in the moment, because the appearance of colour is not determined by the artist - as, for example, still the case in Radical Painting in the 1970s and 80s. Rather, the effect of colour is, to a certain extent, the result of its composition and a transient ambience which constitutes a new quality of colour painting.

At the same time this creates a counter effect which comes close to a mental experiment in Goethe's theory of colour. In the sixth section - sensual and moral effects of colours - Goethe suggests in paragraph 763, that one should be in a monochrome room in order to fully feel the effect of colour on one's mood (which Rupprecht Geiger realized using red colour spaces in the 1970s and 80s) or, alternatively, one should look through coloured glass. Frank Piasta's paintings on mirrors correspond to this perfectly because the room can be perceived in them through a semi-transparent layer. The colour of this layer reveals itself to the room and vice versa. The colour layer is thus not only changed by the surrounding space, but conversely changes it in the same way as coloured glass, albeit by blurring the spatial context.This allows for the colour to be enjoyed not only as being very complex aesthetic phenomenon, but it also works actively on the perception of the viewer. Although unaware of this, the viewer receives the effect of colour from the entire surrounding space. The effect is stronger than in the case of just looking at a normal coloured surface, because thanks to the mirrors, the spatial quality of the painting remains intact.