Touched by Art: Julia Collet & Helge Leiberg

The two make a rather unlikely pair. Helge Leiberg is from Berlin and has focused on performances in which he created his art alongside dancers and musicians. While still in the GDR, he organized the “Day of the Free Book” as a protest action with other artists and was expelled as a result. In his studio at the Palast Hotel, he is also working on a large-format, vibrantly colored painting featuring figures in dance poses. Julia Collet, a very active, very friendly resident of Wiesbaden—who also lives downtown and is a regular guest at the studio on Karlstraße—is obsessed with the motif of the scythe. She calls herself a “scythe woman”; she actually mows meadows, but also repeatedly draws scythe motifs that look like surrealist birds. And she has crocheted herself a “little scythe,” a sort of stuffed animal with a scythe, which she always carries in her arms. She has already decorated the hallway and many walls and doors in the Palast Hotel with grass motifs. She is very active, whirling from room to room, quickly sewing up a broken stuffed animal; she masters all techniques—her giant crocheted crayfish, which she displayed at an exhibition in Wiesbaden’s “Schwalbe 6,” is also legendary. Working directly alongside Helge Leiberg is too intimate for both of them; at first, they still work in separate rooms. But they can both easily imagine a joint artwork emerging on a canvas of enormous size. “Our experimental field,” Julia calls it.  Helge Leiberg has also already integrated a “scythe beak” into his own painting, inspired by Julia Collet’s images, which are already covering the walls after just a few days. The cautious feeling-out process at the start of the project will certainly lead to a particularly creative motif; both bring so much inspiration to the table. (Anja Baumgart-Pietsch; Photos: evim/rui camilo)