Lukas Moll’s figurative oil paintings explore the fragility of memory, identity and human connection. Through blurring, fragmentation and distortion, he creates emotionally charged images that leave room for personal interpretation. Combining an experimental approach with an increasingly expressive painting technique, he investigates the tension between protection and vulnerability, while pushing the boundaries of his work both materially and conceptually.
You will be presenting your work with us at Affordable Art Fair Hamburg from November 5–8. Which aspects of your artistic practice would you particularly like to introduce to a new audience?
I would love for people to look beyond the immediate visual impression of my paintings and discover the emotional narratives behind them. My work explores themes of memory, identity, vulnerability, and the ways in which our experiences shape who we are.
While many of my paintings depict seemingly intimate or familiar moments, I deliberately leave room for interpretation. I am interested in creating images that feel strangely familiar, even when the viewer has no personal connection to the people or situations depicted.
Ultimately, I want my paintings to invite people to reflect on their own experiences and memories, rather than simply presenting them with a fixed narrative.
Your figurative oil paintings exist somewhere between blurring and fragmentation. What gets lost in this process of dissolution, and what becomes visible because of it?
What gets lost is primarily certainty. Facial features, expressions, and details that would normally allow us to identify a person or understand a situation become obscured. The image becomes less specific, but I believe it also becomes more open.
I'm fascinated by the idea that removing visual information can actually add emotional depth. When we can no longer clearly read a face or recognize every detail, we begin to fill those gaps with our own experiences and associations.
In a way, the process of blurring or fragmenting an image shifts the focus from what we see to what we feel. I don't necessarily see this dissolution as destruction, but rather as a transformation that allows something else to emerge.
Memory, identity, and emotional experience are central themes in your work. How does the unreliability of our memory influence the way you develop figures and situations in your paintings?
I find it fascinating that we tend to think of our memories as accurate representations of the past, when in reality they are constantly being reconstructed and altered.
We rarely remember a moment in its entirety. Certain details disappear, others become exaggerated, and sometimes what remains is less a clear image than a particular feeling.
This is something I try to translate into my paintings. The figures and situations I depict often have a photographic quality, suggesting that they capture a specific moment in time. But through blurring, fragmentation, and distortion, that apparent certainty begins to fall apart.
I'm interested in the space between what actually happened, what we remember, and how those memories continue to shape our understanding of ourselves.
You have developed your artistic practice largely as a self-taught artist over more than a decade. Which beliefs or working methods have you maintained, and which have you had to question along the way?
One thing I've maintained throughout my artistic development is curiosity and a willingness to experiment. Because I didn't follow a traditional academic path, I approached painting with relatively few preconceived ideas about how things should be done. I think that freedom has been incredibly valuable to me.
At the same time, I've had to question my own understanding of what makes an artwork valuable. For a long time, I associated artistic quality with technical complexity or the amount of time invested in creating something. Over the years, I've come to understand that the strength of an artwork doesn't necessarily depend on how difficult it was to produce, but on the ideas, decisions, and experiences behind it.
I've also learned that developing a recognizable artistic language doesn't mean repeating yourself indefinitely. It means understanding what is essential to your work while remaining open to change.
Which themes or questions are currently occupying you, and in what direction would you like to develop your painting over the coming years?
Recently, I've been particularly interested in the relationship between masculinity, vulnerability, and protection. I'm exploring how we construct emotional and physical forms of protection, and how these can both shield us and prevent us from connecting with others.
At the same time, my painting technique is undergoing a significant transformation. I'm moving towards a more physical and expressive approach, working with thicker layers of oil paint and dragging tools across the surface to disrupt the image. This introduces an element of unpredictability that I find incredibly exciting.
While my earlier works often had a soft, almost dreamlike quality, I'm increasingly drawn to a more raw and material presence. I want the process of painting itself to become more visible, creating a tension between the figurative image and its physical dissolution.
Looking ahead, I want to explore these possibilities on a larger scale, both in terms of format and conceptual ambition, while continuing to investigate the themes of identity, memory, and human vulnerability that have always been at the heart of my practice.