Façades and Identity
Richard Hilgeman researches through his artthe idea of identity and doublingpersonalities. By bringing on characters andAlter Egos he deals, recording to himself,with the world he sees as untrue,superficial and sensational without content.Where keeping up appearances are mostlypulled beyond truth, but we are also livingin a world where keeping up apparances arethe more ideal of that truth.
This conscious human tragic is relativatedin Richard Hilgemans humor andrepresentation of images.
Richard Hilgeman puts his work and AlterEgo's not between him and the world, but area recognition and a translation of himselfin that world.
He places himself with that everywhere andnowhere, doubled and manipulated the picturefrom vulnerability and expectation.
He takes, as a chameleon, every identity onhim. And creates his own personal arena, inwhich he wrestles the world and himself.
I consider my work like a roleplay.
Every person exists due different layers,exists out of different elements.
In each and everyone of us hides aperpetrator, but at the same time a victim.People have the tendency to judge others ina flash of a second, looking superficiallyat the world and the way other people act.
I'm creating images which look quite commonat first sight, like an everyday scene.
With a closer look, the common is actuallyfar from common and there's always morethan beats the eye.
To make people look and get their attention,you have to surprise them, especially in ourtime where we are bombarded continualslywith all sorts of information.
It's not only the alienative functionalityof the picture I find important.
The sublayers, thats what it's all about,the alienation is nothing more than thesurface where under a total new realityhides.
In the end it's the representation of humantragedy that manifests itself in mywork...
