Layers of color, that reach beneath the surface.

As a contemporary artist, I work with an abstract squeegee technique. Inspired by the painterly language of Gerhard Richter, my works create multi-layered pictorial spaces between control and chance.

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Layering I 2024

Squeegee technique · abstract painting

A glimpse into my process

In this short video, I show the creation process of my works in squeegee technique. You can watch layers of paint being applied, shifted and removed again—and how a multi-layered image structure emerges from it.

Background and inspiration

I am a fine artist specializing in abstract painting in squeegee technique. In my works, color, texture and movement merge into layered visual worlds that evoke landscapes of the unconscious.

Inspired by the painterly language of Gerhard Richter, I develop my own visual handwriting shaped by controlled chance, intuitive gestures, and the precise pull of the squeegee. Layer by layer, pictorial spaces emerge in which calm and tension meet at once.

I understand my works as an invitation to slow looking: meanings are not predefined but arise in the dialogue between image and viewer.

Keywords

Abstract painting with a focus on layering, depth and structure
Squeegee technique as a central painterly tool
Influences: Gerhard Richter, color field painting, geological structures
Format: primarily canvas works, some large-scale

Biography

I was born on July 5, 1986 in Filderstadt and grew up in a village near Bad Liebenzell—surrounded by nature, a large garden, and a nearby farm. My father is a visual artist and sculptor whose abstract painting influenced me early on. My mother supported my creativity, and during school the art room became a place where I drew and painted with great joy and dedication.

As a teenager I performed mime and stage work in a children’s and youth circus. After civilian service I joined the sail training ship Fridtjof Nansen and trained as a ship mechanic in container shipping. For six years I traveled the world’s oceans—the expanse of the sea, shifting light, and the force of nature shaped how I look at color and movement, alongside the influence of my father’s abstract painting and the painterly language of Gerhard Richter.

Back on land I retrained as an IT specialist and worked in tech for several years, but painting never left. Since 2021 I have devoted myself entirely to art. In my studio in Flensburg I create contemporary works in abstract squeegee technique: multilayered pictorial spaces between control and chance, shown in exhibitions across Germany and collected by art lovers.

Portrait of Aurelius Wendelken in the studio

Highlights

Born 1986 in Filderstadt, raised near Bad Liebenzell
Early influence from my father, a visual artist and sculptor
Sail training ship Fridtjof Nansen; trained ship mechanic; six years in container shipping
Artist in Flensburg since 2021; exhibitions and collections across Germany

Squeegee technique & process

I work mainly with acrylic and squeegee technique. Layers of paint are pulled, pushed and partially removed across the surface using a squeegee. Through repeated overlays, pictorial spaces of great density and depth emerge.

In this process, the following emerges:

transparent and opaque fields of color
rhythmic lines, breaks and scratches
visual depth with an almost landscape-like quality
organic structures that evoke geological or atmospheric formations

For me, this technique creates a tension between planning and chance—each work is an unrepeatable outcome of the process.

Process stages

1 · Priming

Laying down the first layers of color and mood.

2 · Layering

Building up, densifying, partially covering—the image becomes complex.

3 · Revealing

Decisions, reduction, finding the final balance.

A glimpse into the attitude behind my paintings.

“My paintings are fragments of emotions. I work with layering, with compression— with what remains beneath the surface. The squeegee technique allows control and chance to wrestle with each other. I place color, give it space—and watch it develop into something larger than my own plan.”

“Abstraction means freedom to me: the eye may wander, meanings may arise. I don’t understand my painting as an answer, but as an invitation—to pause, to dive in, to rediscover one’s own inner landscapes.”

— Aurelius Wendelken

A personal glimpse into my way of working.

I work in the moment—guided by intuition, trusting that spontaneity carries its own truth. Many of my color decisions arise from everyday observations: close-ups of blossoms across the seasons, reflections of light on the fjord, architectural structures while traveling, or the dense sky shortly before a thunderstorm. Even the warm tones of oriental spices accompany me in the process and flow into my works as luminous accents.

Nature is a quiet counterpart. Its colors, its shifts, its atmospheric transitions—like mist over the water that releases light only gently—create spaces in which my works are allowed to come into being.

In my paintings, a growing struggle between surface and color becomes visible. Through repeated glazing, layers condense, come forward, shift, and disappear again. This process of setting and erasing, of control and chance, shapes my expression. Each layer is a decision—and at the same time an opening to the unpredictable.

This is how pictorial spaces arise that do not prescribe but invite: to pause, to discover, to let the gaze wander. Meanings emerge only in dialogue—between work and viewer, between surface and what can be sensed beneath it.

— Aurelius Wendelken