II. 2002 – 2008 Arbeitswelt in den USA - Tylle, H. D.

people working in factories who are normally not involved in art.” He describes his working method in
his East German diary of 1987 (AK 1990/2 Tgb. Tylle p. 76-77): “… and so I attempt in conversation
to make it clear that these studies [of mine] may look like finished oil paintings, but are for me only
the starting point for large-format studio pictures embodying the total experience from painting on
location. This includes all the conversations with the workers and the chance experiences in passing,
so it isn’t simply a question of enlarging the existing pictures. I want to arrive at a global statement
about the work process at this or that plant. Ultimately, my work should be judged only on the basis
of the large formats.”
From an aesthetically abstract point of view, Tylle’s artistic modus operandi can be broken down into
three areas borrowed from the art theory of Classical Antiquity. In his paintings these form a characteristic,
mutually conditional and masterly unit:
a) Autopsia that the painter-chronicler, recording the scene with swift sketches, experiences intensely
on location with the total mental and physical engagement of his powers and senses.
b) Mimesis that enables the painter, after his oil sketch, to execute with graphic conviction an imitational
representation of the reality he has experienced and grasped, to which he imparts composition
and balanced coloration.
c) Skepsis that prevents the reflective, thoughtful artist from burdening the balanced ambivalence of
the picture’s message, the documentary nature of his studies and the aesthetically elaborate depiction
of objective reality with blatantly ideological or situationally incongruous elements or distorting
them with inappropriate stylization.
31