Adib Fricke

Since the genesis of writing, the image of the word has served as the bearer of language. Form is often just as important as content. There are countless writing styles and scripts that we encounter when reading. Only through them does what is written obtain its true weight. With the determination of a swordfighter, Adib Fricke severs his textual material from the verbiage of the day-to-day and reassembles it into blocks of texts. Texts without meaning – supposedly. But the meaning is never lost. Quite the contrary: new spaces open up that extend far beyond the surface of his works.

Hence Fricke’s word-pictures contain few words, are written in large letters, are perfectly positioned technically, and have color backgrounds. But hidden behind each word-picture is a foreword and afterword all its own. Enigmatic and ambiguous, not unlike a Japanese haiku poem.