The painting of Andreas Fasbender moves openly like jazz. Despite a certain level of structure, he works with the free forces of improvisation. Since 2002, he has been tapping into the specific creative potential of children by playfully creating the so-called Collabs together with them: collaborations using the medium of painting.
These abstract works are full of energy and colour, with the artist adding figurative elements such as the toddler motif. During the creation of the paintings, the children, with their impartiality and openness, abandon themselves to their imagination, while focusing their gaze entirely on what they are creating. Fasbender’s interaction with children is not restricted by conventional values, for instance the expectation of something appearing as beautiful. Based on this, the artist follows up with his fundamental critique of the current art world, which, despite its struggle for diversity, continues to exclude children from the exhibition business, at best including them in pedagogical programmes in museums. According to Fasbender, children hold a role in the art world, but only as educational objects and not as self-determining actors in the 'playing field' of art, although children in particular possess abilities that are attributed primarily to artists, such as spontaneity, a penchant for anarchy, authenticity, playfulness and creativity. The concept of purposelessness, which has been associated to art since Kant, is thus according to Fasbender realised in a radical way through children playing. The painter is enabling this through Collabs, as well as a video of some of the painting processes, proposing a new perspective on understanding art through interactions with children.

Andreas Fasbender (b. 1957) studied at the University of Fine Arts Münster until 1985. Fasbender’s works can be found in public collections such as Musée Prouvost, Lille; Osthaus Museum, Hagen; House of the History of the Federal Republic of Germany, Bonn; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney. Fasbender lives and works in Berlin.