About the artist

So, this is where I, Christoffer Gertz Bech, display those scraps of paper, canvas or whatever that I have soiled beyond repair with various kinds of pigment.

Basic facts: Male, Dane, living in Copenhagen, contactable at the adress c.gertz.bech AT gmail-DOT-com.

I have spent pretty much all of my life drawing and trying to get better. As a kid, my comrades may have dreamed about being [insert name of famous football player]. I dreamed about being Michelangelo or Rembrandt. Trying to figure out how the hell they did it, I have spent too much time on paths that ultimately turned out to lead nowhere; not only is it hard to find proper education in those skills today, there is also an enormous amount of bullshit out there, in books or on the internet, claiming this or that about how The Old Masters dood it.

The noble art of drawing and painting well seems to have somehow fallen out of favour in the field of so-called Fine Arts, but I had the idea that it was better preserved in e.g. comics and illustration. For that reason, I studied at the comic book branch at the Belgian art school Institut St-Luc. I had a great year there, but the teaching pretty much sucked. I didn’t realize that at the moment, though; only later did I discover what was actually possible in the field of artistic training.

Only since 2007 have I felt that I was somehow getting on the right track. Still just fumbling around, but at least getting some idea of what seemed to work. In 2009 I have been studying at Studio Escalier in Paris and Argenton-Château, France. That kicked some serious artistic ass. In 2010, I attended a one month workshop with David Kassan. So, that’s what I am armed with right now. It’s up to Time to show whether it will also make me dangerous.