Thomas Lackner, born at Vienna in 1967, passed away on December 14, 2016, came from architecture via joinery to sculptural furniture construction and sculpture. Here, he found wood to be his working material.: „ A natural, honest material with strong character, which is very important for me.“
It is his intension to join the pieces of wood to fine shapes that look like naturally grown, as you may see on his cupboards, but also the powerful discovering of the rough structure of the whole tree-trunks. With these partially opposite methods, the constructive and the destructive one, he creates sensual objects which invite to be touched and which arouse the observer’s desire for closeness.
The sculpture as well as the furniture works are to be regarded as uniform, sculptural works, that communicate with the surrounding in a very intimate way.
„If you believe sculpture is an aggressive job, you are quite right: First of all it is necessary to destroy, in order to convert nature into culture. On the other hand, it is a very sensitive matter, because sculpture means to get into relationship with the created work and to find the best way to its character. Incidentially, I always discover to my own surprise, how many similarities exist between human beeings and trees.“
The objects are manufactured of different solid woods. To preserve the entire sensual empirical value it is essential to maintain the direct contact with the wood. Therefore the surfaces, which are always very fine grinded, even on bigger sulptures, are protected by wood oil only.
„True love and true creativity do not know fear. In the feeling of freedom only they are able to fully blossom.“
This is Thomas Lackner’s important guiding principle.
Thomas Lackner is working at Korneuburg/Lower Austria as a freelance artist.