Rakouch Timallizene

Hendrik Beikirch, who previously also worked under the name ECB, is without doubt a key pioneer of the mural forms that developed out of graffiti. He was one of the first European writers to use graffiti techniques to produce murals that are not centered on textual motifs. On trains and walls he has painted both extremely abstract works redolent of op art as well as captivating representational works, from ominous graphic silhouettes to polished, realistic, atmospheric landscapes. Most astonishing of all is the smooth manner in which Beikirch managed his journey into the deadliest danger zone a graffiti artist can enter: painting on canvas. Beikirch's crepuscular or nocturnal visions of desolate locations (often railway tracks and their surroundings) inimitably evoke the yearning consciousness of the searcher, in both senses of that word. These way stations (in both senses of that term, too) can be seen as landscapes of the graffiti artist's soul around the turn of the millennium. Today, Beikirch is achieving global success with his large, sensitive portraits, usually of older people at the diverse edges of modern civilization. What is special about these portraits is that digital photography is wholly absent from the process of creating them, from Beikirch's initial sketches to the final murals, some of which stretch right along the side walls of high-rises.