Albert Oehlen ’s exhibition Schweinekubismus (pig cubism) presents three diverse work groups made between 2021 and 2024: There are large-format shaped canvases from the Ömega-Man series, whose outlines resemble an Ω symbol that strikes a cartoon-like pose, circumscribing an arena where different forms of abstractions collide—color fields, gestural strokes, palette splotches. There are aluminum sculptures that translate omega-related shapes into 3-D torsos of lumpen bodies and tube-like extensions, forms that almost threaten to become function. And then there are untitled canvases that take up elements from different periods in the artist ’s earlier work to maybe illustrate the show ’s title: they wallow in joyful colors, some areas free-flowing, some stacked on top of each other like a most literal take on cubism.

HANS WERNER HOLZWARTH: In your exhibition at Potsdamer Straße, you are showing three groups of works: Omega shapes, sculptures and new paintings you have called ‘Pig Cubism’. Shall we start with the very striking and unusual shapes?

ALBERT OEHLEN: The Ömega-Men are the conclusion of a group of works I’ve been making and displaying over the past few years. I’m now showing the final works, there will be no more to come. They are shaped canvases, where I have used the omega as a picture carrier. I also engaged with that form by seemingly changing the shape with the help of the yellow wall paint. Of course, that’s cheating the viewer, but it also offers a glimpse into the future. The trompe-l’œil of the atomic age. So the theme is not defined in terms of painting technique, it’s about this shape.

HWH: And the title refers to the movie The Omega Man with Charlton Heston?

AO: No, the associations with the film only came later. It started when I found this shape within my earlier project of incomprehensible brown paintings. When one of the pictures was finished, I discovered this form in it and realised its power. I noticed that it looks like a symbol and I noticed the characteristics of that symbol: there are these splayed legs, it’s like a cephalopod, basically genderless. Then it struck me that traditionally this asexuality was always rendered in pink. When the masculine became feminine and vice versa, following the usual connotations, there was an element of tenderness. But that’s over now. I’ve called it Ömega-Man so that it’s about me again.

HWH: You’ve neutralised it?

AO: I was suddenly confronted by this nasty, aggressive beast. It seemed like something I hadn’t seen before. I had found this theme in a painting of mine. I don’t want to express or say anything with it. I have great reservations about symbols, they tend to make me feel uneasy. That’s also the case with this symbol, except that the Ömega Man doesn’t mean anything. I know that because I made it. Except it still threatens you with the end.

HWH: Alpha and Omega.

AO: Alpha and Omega is so global in its meaning that it’s fun to work with. And you don’t burn your fingers on something that constantly changes its meaning with the times. So of course the movie is great and all the associations are fun, but I wasn’t aiming for anything specific.

HWH: Sure, but the images create such associations in the viewer.

AO: When you look at something, associations happen all the time, even nonsensical ones. People always say about a completely abstract picture: But there’s a little dog staring at me, or something like that… That’s a phenomenon that as a painter you simply have to accept because it exists.

HWH: You also deal with this phenomenon yourself when you paint, when a form emerges in the picture…

AO: … which I then paint out again. What I don’t want, I do away with.

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In collaboration with Galerie Max Hetzler, Berlin | Paris | London | Marfa