The Challenge

In his speech, "The Eunuch and Love", at the opening of his special exhibition, "10 Years of Lettl-Atrium", on November 6, 2003, Wolfgang Lettl had this to say about the painting, "The Challenge":

A young cyclist is pedalling along a zigzagging, towering, long, but not endless wall. Apart from the large eyes painted on it that look down on the cyclist, the wall reminds me of the modern industrial buildings along the highway in the area around Bologna.

It is not apparent whether the eyes take note of either the cyclist or the viewer of the painting. We see the cyclist from behind. The fact that he wears black pants and a discreetly red shirt is probably only of formal importance, meant to add some colour to the picture. For apart from the white walls, and without being really menacing, only the grey asphalt floor is visible, as well as the equally grey sky which turns brighter and yellowish further up and takes on a dark blue-grey tint further down, especially in the little piece of horizon left open by the wall.

The young cyclist lends the image a likeable human reference point, but he seems a bit lost and out of place in this depressing industrial desert. A car or two would be more more in keeping with the times in this place, but also more anonymous.
On repeated observation one gets the impression that the cyclist is not particularly goal-oriented as he wavers through the area, you believe that you see him pedal and that the wheels are turning. That his bicycle has no chain doesn't seem to matter, a painted bike can run without a chain, the painter was thinking, and he doesn't enjoy painting chains.

What is the significance of this wall? A wall always represents a limit even when it is made of glass. And anyone wanting to enter or get through will be looking for an opening. But this one doesn’t have an opening. It is really difficult to guess what its purpose might be. Do the eyes perhaps mean that you cannot enter unnoticed, or is the whole thing perhaps just a cardboard fake?

As I was considering what to tell you about this painting today, I thought I was full of ideas. So many questions arise: What is it about this monotonous region and how did the cyclist get there; what does he want anyway? Why does his bike move although it has no chain? The previous answer is not quite satisfactory. Why does the cyclist seem so indifferent? You can tell from behind. He should at least be looking anxious!

Could the painting be an allegory for a situation perceived thus by some or most people: We do not know where we come from. We do not know where we are going. We do not know what we are here for. We do not know what time is. Nor do we know what matter is. Or what came before the beginning, and we cannot imagine how the end will end. In the final analysis we know nothing, but Socrates already knew as much. All this is clear, or rather unclear, and occasion enough to think about it and to paint a picture that represents so impressively the lost and helpless condition of humankind.