David Ostrowski (*1981) has produced a body of work that revolves around the idea of the zero point—a place of nothingness or the beyond of cultural and painterly codes. Ostrowski’s paintings are products of a desire to eliminate painterly knowledge. They are expressions of the idea that in producing notions of emptiness, one also grapples with and comments on the history of painting. The Cologne-based artist’s light-handed and complex approaches to the non-motif open the space of the canvas to unique breaches of perception and an unexpected freedom of seeing.

David Ostrowski
So kalt kann es nicht sein / It can´t be that cold
Sprüth Magers and Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther und Franz König
David Ostrowski is known for a reduced but complex formal expression and his minimalistic abstract canvases in white or black. The artist's most recent works mark his systematic approach to another "non-color" – a conventional, commercial gray. In this new group of works, Ostrowski repeatedly paints over the primarily small-format works while exposing isolated forms, highlighting them or adding to them. A process that is also reflected in the dating of his works, some of which indicate different years of creation (e.g. 2008/2020 or 2005/2021).
Ostrowski combines the titles of the new works from his typical F and names of well-known popular musicians, such as F (Faith Hill) and F (Chris Isaak). Authors of an eminently accessible music that surrounds us in everyday life – including the artist who listens to it on CD in his studio.
The catalog with texts by Fabian Schöneich and Oliver Tepel takes readers through our exhibition It can't be that cold and close to Ostrowski's work.