TONDO

The inspiration for the TONDO series came from studying the famous polar map ‘Septentrionalium Terrarum Descriptio’ published in 1595 by the Duisburg cartographer Gerhard Mercator (1512–1592).
Mercator relied on a mythical and imaginative interpretation of the polar geographical location in the 16th century and followed medieval legends, such as those from Jacobus Cnoyens' travelogue, rather than real observations.
I was particularly fascinated by the aesthetics of this world-famous cartographic gem. It reminded me of mandalas, those complex patterns that are usually arranged in a circular pattern and were originally used in Buddhism.
Tondi were already popular in ancient times and in ancient Rome. Michelangelo's Tondo Doni is a famous example from the Renaissance, and Kandinsky's Circle within a Circle also took up the circular image in modern art.

I began experimenting with the format and decided to use circular metal plates of the same diameter (the size of a traffic sign). This was a significant change, as I had always worked with canvas before and was accustomed to an absorbent painting surface. Eventually, I found my own tondo style. Always accompanied by music, I put myself in a state between meditation and reflection for the creative process. Using the method of controlled chance, I gathered excerpts from magazines, scientific drawings, microscope images of single-celled organisms, nerves or atomic nuclei and much more on the plate, to which I reacted with spray paint, ink or acrylic paint, among other things. The result was tondi with ornamental structur, fine lines and areas of colour. Calm met movement, nature met technology. During the creative process, the surreal images were rotated again and again until they found their own orientation, their top and bottom. The works have no titles; it is up to the viewer to follow their own associations.

Wilfried Schaus-Sahm