Wolfgang Bloch
Untitled NO. 117, 2007.
Oil on vintage wood.
23″ X 48″
The 3rd Annual Surf Film Festival is playing at the Honolulu Academy of Art’s Doris Duke Theatre right now. They’ll be showing surf films from July 9th to the 30th. Last week I caught Hanging Five: Five Surfers – Five Artists. It’s about, you guessed it, five artists that surf and create surf inspired art. The movie was entertaining and inspiring but what really stuck with me was the work of one artist in particular – Wolfgang Bloch.
He paints waves. But, they aren’t just any waves, they are moody waves. In the film, they show him scavenging through piles of old wood looking for textures that could create the foundation for a landscape. One piece forms the sand, one forms the sky. Where the two pieces meet, he paints a wave.
The textures, tones and scale of the work sells it. For surfers, there’s nothing better than seeing a perfect peeling wave, with absolutely no one else around.
