A few years ago, the KGB released a telegram in which Albert Speer reported to Hitler that having visited various work camps, he was of the opinion that the prisoners were given too much space. A short while later, Speer and his wife went on a skiing holiday. All this gave me the idea for an exhibition about architecture and snow. <br>Albert Speer´s importance for Berlin has in my opinion increased a lot in recent years. This is because, since reunification, the city of Berlin has transformed itself into a megalomaniac building site. A psychosis of making Berlin become the most important city in Germany once again has developed. As I write these words, Speer´s baroque thoughts „manic architecture“ are at the back of my mind; an architecture where decay is implicit.

My exhibition, „The Architect“ is made up of eight pictures which actually show very little architecture, apart from one of a still standing memorial. The picture shows walled in facades and a long wall-like row of huts. The rest of the pictures are either embryonic or covered. The basic colour is like a blue light. These are pictures with a veiled charisma and which have a claustrophobic effect when shown together, especially as shown in the Galerie carlier | gebauer, a former apartment in Berlin’s central district. With one exception, all the pictures show exterior views, sometimes with panoramic landscapes.

With this exhibition, it was important for me to create an atmosphere in which my earlier works on this subject can be seen as if in slow motion, so that they can be reconsidered not without controversy. What we are actually talking about here are pictures of memories which, with a certain illusionary charm, are supposed evoke remembered pictures like in a documentary, but which appear internalised due to the paintings&amp;Mac226; stasis.

In doing this I wish to intimate that after the event, only ambivalence remains.

On 2nd March at 11:15 in the morning, I shall arrive at the historical airport Tempelhof. The exhibition, „The Architect“, will be my first in Berlin.” – Luc Tuymans