December Issue
Art and the Photo: Wolfgang Bloch
"Bloch has cultivated a refined style of painting that is entirely unique-yielding pieces that highlight simplicity and perfection while simultaneously evoking a thoughtfulness that is rare in surf artistry".
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Art and the Photo: Wolfgang Bloch
By Brad Melekian, Surfer Magazine
As our second in the series examining the interplay between art and photography, we offer the work of Wolfgang Bloch. Born and raised in Ecuador, far from any surf scene, Wolfgang's surfing experience was stripped to it's most basic components, and there's something of that purity alive today in his artwork. Whereas Wolfgang's love for surfing blossomed from simple beginnings into a thoroughly modern surf lifestyle, he has worked the opposite direction with his artwork, moving from career as a very prolific designer into a livelihood as a fine artist with an appreciation for subtlety.
One look at his paintings and it's apparent that Bloch has an inherent filter to block out the unnecessary and accentuate the essential. It's through the practice of such selective inclusion that Bloch has cultivated a refined style of painting that is entirely unique-yielding pieces that highlight simplicity and perfection while simultaneously evoking a thoughtfulness that is rare in surf artistry.
It was only a year ago that Wolfgang alighted on what has been his most successful fine art campaign to date - a fundamental study of horizons and dark seascapes. " I just wanted to be simple about it."
Now, at 41, Wolfgang is working with mixed media, constantly evolving along with his work, creating paintings of lineups that blend photographs with paint and found objects that pique his artistic sensibilities, creating a work of surf art that is at once inspiring, emotional, authentic, complex and simple. Something every surfer can relate to.
