Vision and Hope

Didi was the first to introduce skateboards on the german market in the 1960s. After surviving kidney cancer he was diagnosed with parkinson 10 years ago. Didi has attended a couple of painting courses at the Summer Academy. This year like last year he participates with Norbert Bisky saying that Bisky got a bit stricter with his critique compared to last year.

Emmanuel has lived for three years on the streets of Daressalam, Tanzania, before he found his path to painting. He is the project coordinator of the Vijana Vipaji Foundation that is dedicated to "empower artists through local held workshops that enable them to interact with local and international artists in the expression of creativity."

Didi: "We had lunch together and I thought it was a good idea to do something together."

Emanuel: "It is kind of challenging because we work in different styles and we also have different ideas how to do art. I feel very excited to work with Didi because I had to bring my own kind of abstraction to it."

Didi: "There is something like a border in the middle. Emanuel painted on the left side, I painted on the right side."

Emanuel: "We didn't have a discussion like we are going to paint this and this. We just put the plain canvas on the ground and throw the colours."

Didi: "The two figures on the right are the politicians who talk. Left is mister Obama and right is Merkel and in between is a revolver. I don't know who shoots whom."

Emanuel: "My figure on the left is responding to the picture on the right. There is a block for many developing countries to come to Europe or to America. But the picture is having some hope because now there are a lot of changes. People now are collaborating, they are working together in terms of economics doing business, people are travelling like this exchange program of artists coming here. So this image has a lot of hope. It has all the colours of the different nations to see a hope for fairness in the future. The eyes are closed because when you feel a very important feeling you close your eyes. Such a feeling you can just visualize by yourself inside. Hope is not visible."

The painting was auctioned and Jean Marc from Switzerland got it for a good price.

Emanuel: "It will have more value for him. The art will remain there. It is not like food that will expire."