Heinke WAR LOVES US, 2024
The Art Walk
WAR LOVES US, 2024
Art is the attempt to depict the world, human existence and everyday life in a poetic form, thus making it more understandable, accessible or tangible. So, for better understanding, by way of a roundabout route. If this prerequisite is mentally examined and met, art can basically take on any form.“
EDUCATION
Grants, awards, recognition
2017/18 Artist in Residence at Chateau de Drouilles, Unseld Scholarship, Drouilles / Haute-Vienne
2008 scholarship, Sammlung Lenikus Wien
2009 scholarship, Frankfurter Künstlerhilfe e.V.
2011 Artist in Residence Vienna, scholarship from the Culture Office Frankfurt
2012-14 Professorial position, Johannes Gutenberg University
2013 Anthology Award, Charlie Smith London
2017-18 Artist in Residence at Chateau de Drouilles, Unseld Scholarship
2012 Myth & Truth, Artistbook & Catalogue raisonné I, Unseld Verlag
2018 Paradise Overdosed, Artistbook & Catalogue raisonné II, Unseld Verlag
2026 Dalla Prigione, Artistbook & Catalogue raisonné III, Tough Empathy Press
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A Closer Look at the Work
Florian Heinke The work was created within the joint artistic practice of Christiane and (Florian Heinke CF Heinke), but appears in this context under the name . The collaboration between the two has been the foundation of the works, texts, and conceptual developments for many years.
WAR LOVES US It combines painting, language and public presentation into a rotating sequence of images. The work deliberately uses the mechanisms of large-scale advertising: strong contrasts, quick recognition and constant repetition in the urban space. At the same time, however, it refuses the clarity of classic advertising images.
The sentence does not WAR LOVES US function as a political slogan in the strict sense, but as an open social commentary. It describes an attraction to conflict, overwork, and permanent tension within modern societies. The rotation of the images reinforces this state—meaning does not arise statically, but in the continuous interplay between image and word.
The three works form loose stages of a fragmented narrative:
WAR — „Give me the words(paintings)“ shows the intimate closeness between outsiders and the possibility of connection outside of normative structures.
LOVES — „Pleasures of the damned(Paintings)“ describes a labyrinth of social systems as well as figures who evade these mechanisms.
US — „The Landing of the Ark (Painting)“ depicts the arrival in a new, uncertain future without clear direction or certainty.
In the context of Ardi Goldmans social plastic Uniongelände, the work becomes part of a public discourse.
WAR LOVES US It sees itself there as a reminder of independent thinking and self-sufficient action, in defiance of the temptation to conform to the norm.
About the Artist
Florian Heinke (*1981 in Frankfurt am Main) lives and works in Frankfurt am Main. After studying at the Mainz Art Academy, he moved to the Städelschule Frankfurt am Main, where he graduated in 2009 as a master student under Christa Näher.
Works by Florian Heinke were exhibited internationally and are in private and institutional collections worldwide.
From 2025, the artistic practice will be officially conducted Florian Heinke as a collaborative work of Christiane and CF Heinke. They also run the Tough Empathy Club and the Tough Empathy Press, which are also platforms, work structures, and components of the artistic practice.
The collaboration has existed in the background for many years and forms the conceptual, textual and structural basis of numerous works, exhibitions and publications.
The work is generally systematic in nature. Paintings are presented that allow for limited accessibility for collectors and the public. Paintings are user interfaces that symbolically represent the underlying structure.
They show the idea of a painting and are components of the artistic overall structure.
This practice began in 2007 and continues to this day. CF Heinke’s work can be understood as structural and disintegrating.
The artists’ books Myth & Truth, Paradise Overdosed and Dalla Prigione are simultaneously understood as an artists’ book, an autobiographical fragment and a catalogue of works.
Photos: © Stefan Gröpper Photography
Ardi Goldman Kunst-
und Kulturstiftung gGmbH
Uniongelände
Hanauer Landstraße 188, 60314 Frankfurt am Main