(Innsbruck 1932–2011 Vienna)
“California revisited”, on the reverse on the canvas overlap signed, dated Markus Prachensky 2001 as well as on the stretcher titled, dated California revisited 2001 and inscribed with Lindenplatz (Galerie am Lindenplatz, Vaduz?), acrylic on canvas, 130 x 100 cm, on stretcher

Provenance:
Private Collection, Graz

...California revisited: Preparations became steadily more thorough. The overlapping meanings of form and colour created the maximum possible amount of persuasiveness (with Miles Davis offering a constant level of meditation). Now everything is already being practiced in the mind. This includes the chronological order of the colours: the third colour, applied as desired, is always the one that starts. It is only the two reds used subsequently that ultimately “define” (I would say) the colour.
Brushwork also forms part of the preparations. In addition to all the movements and flicks of the brush, there is also the question of lighter or increased pressure. This affects the quantity of paint flowing off the brush, which can either fully cover the black background, or just leave a gloss on the top of it, creating exceptionally strange intermediary shades atop the blackness that represents the background in every sense. (My wife calls them “mystical”).

This would be barely thinkable without the experience gained over the course of forty-five years, as mentioned, neither in terms of planning or, indeed, in terms of execution.
And there is something else involved as well: this highly sophisticated contemplation of effect also leads to an increased willingness to take risks, too – with the aim of fully doing justice to the tension in its entirety. The existing paintings from California Revisited (I say this because canvases have had to be destroyed here, too) reveal the utmost level of control. They are the outcome of highly risky endeavours that have nevertheless been fully grasped: the precise implementation of intention.

Wolfgang Fleischer – Markus Prachensky. Eine Retrospektive, Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, 2002