Before the Early Train

During the sixties, people waiting for buses and trains was a theme that Werner Berg dealt with on numerous occasions. The artist himself often took the train to Klagenfurt, and at the train station he observed the waiting commuters on their early morning way to work. For him waiting was just as much of an existential theme as travelling and being on the road. In most of his paintings of people waiting, the group of figures fills the canvas. Here, in contrast, the most conspicuous motif is an unusually rich winter landscape with a crescent moon. As is so often the case in Berg’s work, the uniqueness and effectiveness of this painting is rooted in the special, indivisible link between the human and the landscape. If one were to cover up the two figures, the landscape would seem strangely empty, and conversely, the two figures alone seem insignificant. It is the link between the human and nature in the depiction that gives rise to its special magic.