Opinions of Heiner Lammers and his art

Dr. Flora Brune, Gernsheim

"The works of Heiner Lammers have impressed me by the floating lightness of his complex compositions and its colour choreography. In his characteristic style you can always recognise the underlying melody of his emotions that let them develop in your own fantasies. The existing virtuosity of his technique gives the works of this newcomer a soul deep vitality."

Engelbert Hüging, Brisbane/Australien

"During my last stay in Germany I had the opportunity to get an insight into the artistic work of Heiner Lammers. As a former long-time teammate in the German table tennis team Heiner and I am impressed with how much passion, determination and professionalism he pursues his painting career. Probably it is  granted only a few elite athletes to experience after their career a life as meaningful as in their young days."

Herwarth Brune, CEO ManpowerGroup Germany

"In the virtuosity of Heiner Lammers´paintings I have found a kind antipode of abstraction. With his paintings, termed "Coincidence Art", the newcomer has found his own way to be repeatedly surprised through improvisation."

On the occassion of a Charity exhibition, which was organized by the Protestant church municipality in Büttelborn for the restoration of the church roof, Lammers´artist friend Siggi Liersch stated in his address at the opening day:

From the concrete to the abstraction - the painter Heiner Lammers

«"Everybody would like to understand the art. Why does one not try to understand the songs of a bird? Why does one love the night, the flowers, everything around us without wanting to understand it absolutely? But if it is about a picture, peaple think they must "understand" it.»

Pablo Picasso

Heiner Lammers was born in 1951 in Cloppenburg and worked for approx. 1 1/2  years primarily as a painter. He is married and has two sons. He spent his youth in Gießen.

He painted a lot as a child, but ceased after failing to win any prizes in painting competitions for children. However, in about 2001, he took part in a competition in the municipality of Mörfelden-Walldorf, winning one of twelve prizes on offer.

If one speaks of his passion for painting, one may have to mention also his decades long passion for table tennis. In 1965 he had begun to play table tennis and it was immediately apparent that he was performance oriented.

From this time forward, he juggled school and his professional life with table tennis.

Sometime he spoke with his wife of his childhood enthusiasm for painting. She took that as an opportunity to give him an box of oil paints with all accessories. That was about twenty years ago. Since then he has regained his passion and remained basically "on the ball". With the aid of high-quality textbooks, he has absorbed painting techniques in the last two decades, being self-taught. His ambition has shifted, so to speak, but there are certainly parallels between table tennis and painting. Heiner Lammers is ambitious and believes ambition is always inate. He persues his interests passionately, aiming for the highest standards he can achieve.

For Heiner Lammers the unexpected result is the most desired of all possibilities. At the beginning of every abstract picture he feels much tension, but also anticipation. Somehow it reminds him of his time as a sportsman. For him, the concrete painting stands in stark contrast to that. This is because he is able to do this only to well, and therefore knows the result from the start.

He also has favorite colours. These are all blue colours and colours with a blue cast. This could be reflected in his paintings, but he still tries hard not to ignore any other colours when painting abstract pictures. Every colour has its chance with him.

Heiner Lammers was already very interested in the search for aesthetics when he played table tennis. Nowadays, he wants to create beautiful pictures, or nothing at all. He doesn´t want to make a pre-conceived statement through his pictures. They should be interpreted by the viewer.

Painting is not a competition for him, because every piece of art stands alone and should not be compared to others. Therefore, art should not be part of a competition. Here also lies the main difference to table tennis. There one would like to achieve success and stand on the medal podium. There one can define success and failure. Typically for sport, awards and recognition do not follow measurable. There are no statstic, no ranking lists. Art finds acclaim or not. Aesthetics is of primary concern in this artform. Art raises us and creates for us desired and bitterly necessary moments of happiness and realisation.

For Heiner in this sense fanciful sales figures for art are mad, because many pieces of art simply disappear in safes as an investment and therefore do not fulfill anymore its original purpose of being shown to the general public.

At this point we should say thank you to his wife Christiane, as she was the one who has reactivated this passion again. Quoting Heiner Lammers: "I have already said before, without her I would nowadays possibly not paint at all. Besides, she always encourages me to keep going whenever doubts about my artistic activities strike me. She has worked on me for a long time to go public. She has almost pushed me into that direction. Now she has achieved this goal."

                                                                                 Siggi Liersch

Newspaper article (only German newspaper)