I was always outside as a child, skiing in winter, from spring to autumn we followed the smell of the mushrooms, my brother, my parents and I. Small hikes along Lake Thun, nothing spectacular, swimming a bit, making a fire a bit, sometimes we caught a fish, sometimes we didn't catch one.
It always pulled me out later. I was in my mid-twenties, worked as a sign painter, a dying profession, and at that time lived quite secluded on a high plateau in the Schwarzenburgerland, roamed through the woods whenever possible, climbed down into the gorge to the ice-cold scythe. There are people who ask me what I'm actually looking for out there - and I always answer the same thing: I'm not looking for anything in particular, except for mushrooms. I walk around, I always have to physically experience a place, have to become one with my surroundings, I prefer to sleep in the open air. I'm more balanced out there , more focused and experience many things more intensely when I'm in the bush, be it somewhere in Switzerland, Iceland or the Yukon, which I've traveled again and again over the past ten years. Footprints in the snow. Wafts of mist on the beach. The crimson blood of a gutted elk. Something archaic happens to me in these places where everything is raw, where no calls reach me, no headlines of distant wars, stock market crashes and child soldiers. I feel free.
But I'm not a recluse. I like the shimmering energy of New York, I like Zurich, I lived in a prefabricated housing estate on the outskirts of Leipzig for a few months - and it was great. I like people, I just don't like crowds, I don't like shopping malls, I don't like escalators. Too much plastic repels me, I prefer wood and stones. Someone who is very close to me once called me a wood person. I think that sums it up pretty well.
My camera is my companion, but I don't go out looking for pictures. I've been on the road for weeks without thinking about taking photos. Even when I meet bears, I rarely pull out my camera — there are so many bear pictures. I can not do this. I do not want that. My pictures are simply created. Suddenly something thickens. One moment. A feeling.
Many say my paintings radiate such calm, but for me they are full of life: I know their stories, I remember where I stood and what it smelled like; know if mosquitoes ate me or if there was a strong wind. Sometimes nothing happens for days. You can't control that. You can't force nature, you have to be able to endure this calm. Wait. His. Then I go looking for wood, make a fire, boil water, prepare for the night, read a few pages from a book. I've been waiting for a very specific picture for years.
If I've learned one thing from fishing, it's this: you can buy the most expensive rod, you can choose the right bait, the perfect spot, the perfect time, but there's no guarantee the fish will bite. This uncertainty fascinates me. That's what I want to capture with my paintings, the untameability.
(Bruno Augsburger, March 2014)
You can find more works by Bruno Augsburger on his website: 
