For the 'Restaurant im Almhof Schneider', Christian Thanhäuser has created a woodcut herbarium.
The starting point for the motifs of the maple panels ranged from plants that were used by the Walser people as food, and often as medicine, to the mountainous landscapes and legendary figures of Walser stories to invented motifs of plants and animals.
I have enjoyed a warm friendship for many years with the Schneider family and Paul Renner. Katia and Gerold Schneider placed a lot of trust in me when they invited me to design images for the wooden panels on the walls as part of the redesign of the restaurant in Almhof.
From the early phase of the Hell Fire Touring Club, Paul Renner and I have been accustomed to working together. Even though our working methods are technically different, there have never been misunderstandings; often a few keywords were enough, as in the Villa Maund, at the foot of Etna, in the catacombs of Palermo, in the Moravian Karst, on the dams of Bohemian carp ponds... usually, our hands already knew what to do.
Paul loves the sensuality of colors; I tend to limit myself to light-dark contrasts and graphic techniques. The resin that emerges when cutting into the wood inspires, intoxicates, and is also found in Paul's works. So, on the one hand, there is baroque color richness, and on the other, the quiet, meditative linearity. The viewer, when passing through the door, can explore their own world between two, at first glance, completely different series of images that connect upon closer inspection.
The starting point for the motifs on the maple panels were plants used for food or medicine by the Walser people in the high mountains, as well as mythical figures of the Walser, and even invented motifs between plant and animal - and structures shaped by the flow, by ice, sun, and lichens on the mountain walls. All of this is connected with the question: what did the mountains look like 200 million years ago, and what will they look like in 200 million years? What about the rivers and seas, the course of the Lech, the Danube?
I am happy to demonstrate how drawings are transformed into woodcuts in my workshop in Ottensheim on the Danube. There is a vast difference between one wood and another; the Mohr carpentry could not have provided a better supply.
What wine recommendation now for the Botanicum? Erin and Jean-Louis Chave have seen my works and invited me to design new wine labels for their domain. Soon, their wonderful wines will also be available with my label designs.
All these works and the exciting dialogues, the collective contemplation, have brought me great joy. The Hell Fire Touring Club will continue to be on the road to uncover the hidden peculiarities of the world.
Christian Thanhäuser
Tirana, November 2016
