Between composition and chaos

Manuela Karin Knaut's paintings reflect her enthusiasm for traveling, discovering new places, and stepping outside her comfort zone. She is particularly fascinated by the harsh reality of the streets of Johannesburg, the chaotic life in the townships, the colorful diversity of Accra, and the graffiti of street artists in Brooklyn. It is the brokenness and imperfection that appeal to Knaut and that she integrates into her large-scale installations and painterly language. She consciously seeks confrontation with the fringes of society and the rough edges of life.

In her work, the artist expresses an almost childlike curiosity and sense of adventure. Her paintings are a play with color, form, line, abstraction, and figuration. She uses bold brushstrokes, which she repeatedly reworks, and incorporates everyday objects, which she outlines with lines, paints over, or reveals again.

Knaut combines a variety of materials in her paintings, inspired by street art. She glues scrap paper, photographs, pieces of fabric, and text fragments, binding, tearing, sewing, or nailing found objects into her works. Her working process is dynamic and unconventional: she adds, reduces, scrapes, and rubs. A creative chaos reigns in her studio, with works in various stages of development simultaneously. Yet despite the apparent chaos, she always recognizes the precise moment when a painting is "finished"—sometimes after a few minutes, sometimes after days or weeks.

Upon completion, the work is presented on a plain wall, checked, and signed. In this moment, an unexpected calm spreads, leaving viewers room for their own thoughts and interpretations as they immerse themselves in the colorful world of Manuela Karin Knaut.