”The history of abstraction is long and varied. Deciding where to situate the beginning of this history will always involve an element of interpretation, and then – from Eduard Manet or Auguste Rodin to Paul Cézanne or Henri Matisse, to Wassiliy Kandinsky or Kasimir Malevich and Bernett Newman or Mark Rothko – we are confronted with very different and sometimes contrary approaches and goals in the process of liberating colour and form from their mimetic function and abandoning the realism of the object. In Hansjörg Dobliar’s sculptures, oil paintings, and works on paper and collages, geometrical forms and cubic surfaces are dynamically posited into the pictorial space, with clear points of reference to abstract art in general and German Expressionism in particular. But in all of these works, an individual quality and idiosyncratic spirituality breaks through the formalisms and takes centre stage. This characteristic feature of Dobliar’s works makes use of the formal language of abstraction in specific connotations, but does not look at abstract art from any analytical or historical viewpoint. On the contrary, Dobliar’s approach is both independent and almost impertinent – he makes use of the attractive and decorative elements within this language of abstraction combined with quite new ways of painting, so giving expression to a completely contemporary and modern sense of aesthetics. ”

Susanne Gaensheimer