october 2024

ECHOES THROUGH TIME
In my early career, I assembled a portfolio showcasing my best work—including the spaceship model—in a sleek, screen-printed box with a carefully crafted letter. I sent it off to Douglas Trumbull, the special effects artist, at Industrial Light & Magic in Los Angeles. Of course, I didn’t receive a response. I imagined my phone would be ringing off the hook back in Germany, with an urgent message: “When can you start?” Back then, in the pre-digital age, I would have had to hop on a plane to LA and show up at their doorstep. But, naturally, I heard nothing.

Then, decades later, a trustee reached out. He had discovered the portfolio—complete with photos, slides, and that letter—tucked away in a villa in LA. He asked if I’d like it returned; the owner had kept it carefully stored in his cabinet. I politely declined, thinking, "What would I do with that old stuff?"

A few months later, I met my friend Dalibor Farny, the Nixie tube maker, in Berlin. He casually mentioned, “Guess what I bought? That very portfolio from the U.S. with all your work.” Quite the story, isn’t it?

september 2024

Back in the day, I crafted a spaceship model with big dreams of hitting LA and making waves in film design. Time has a funny way of bending dreams.
That path shifted, but that model stuck around, eventually finding a new orbit in a friend’s chic Vienna apartment. Now, it’s more than just a throwback—it’s a nod to a dream that’s still very much alive, grounded here on Earth but always looking skyward.

august 2024

This old Citroën 2CV has become a symbol of timeless beauty, reminding me that some moments are meant to be savored, like the exquisite wine of the region. It captures a snapshot of my vacation in the south of France, where time seemed to stand still.
Cadenet, France

march 2022

Exhibition at Schinkel Pavillon in Berlin highlights the Swiss artist H.R. Giger (1940–2014), famous for creating the Alien creature. Giger’s dark, imaginative work features creatures that express their deepest urges in unsettling ways, challenging societal norms.

june 2019

Chateau La Napoule, France
Artist´s studio of Henry Clews (1876 – 1937)
The château became the home and studio of American artist Henry Clews Jr., who transformed it into a vibrant artistic space. Clews was a sculptor and painter, and he filled the château with his works, blending art with the historic setting.

january 2018

Toothsome Chocolate Emporium at Universal Studios, Orlando (opening 2017)
Machine Light 07
Seeing the spirit of Machine Light 07 illuminating Toothsome Chocolate Emporium’s streets has been… eye-opening.

Looking forward to a brighter collaboration where creativity and credit go hand in hand!

may 2017

TRONA, Borax mining town, CA
Staggering scary or scary staggering.
USA 2017

june 2017

Tonopah, NV
Neglected beauty
USA 2017

october 2016

ONCE UPON A TIME
TV series on ABC, Season II, Episode 12
Thrilled to see Machine Light 01 make an unexpected cameo on Once Upon a Time! Let's chat about creative credits for future collaborations.

july 2015

BENEATH THE MOON II
Artwork by sculptor Miquel Navarro
"Beneath the moon II" is an imaginary city that can be read in endless ways. Like architects and planners children remodel space, discover the ideas of horizontality and verticality and generate new urban landscapes every day.
Centre Pompidou Malaga, Spain 2015

may 2015

Distinctive radiator grille design
at "Collection Schlumpf".
National Automobile Museum in Mulhouse, France 2014
Above: Paul Arzens "La Baleine" (the whale), 1938. Roughly welded radiator grille.

april 2015

BEAUTIFUL EYESORES
Sunset with overhead power lines in San Francisco, 2013.

march 2015

The rough side of the workshop.

december 2014

SPACESHIP model (yet unfinished)
Length 2 meter, polyester, wood, LED lighting

Once upon a time...
in a small flat

november 2014

LICHTGRENZE-LIGHT BORDER
A symbolic frontier of lights, consisting of thousands illuminated balloons to be lit the weekend of November 9th. The light installation traces an approx. 15 km long segment of the former 155 km course of the wall.

FALL OF THE OF THE BERLIN WALL
The most significant event in recent German history:
The Fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989.
Here is a bunch of pictures.

october 2014

From rough to smooth

september 2014

When driving on the road you brush by many tall trucks. Always reminds me of a movie I greatly admire, Steven Spielberg's DUEL. Here a few of harmless sequences, California 2013.

august 2014

Nature conquers back

july 2014

SUBDUED LINES
Commisioned work with satinized glass shades.

june 2014

ARRESTED DECAY
Abandoned gold-mining town Bodie, California.

april 2014

Breaking a sweat for no.01

march 2014

ABANDONED BERLIN
Crackled textures and colours.

Beelitz Heilstätten was built between 1898 and 1930 as a sanatorium commissioned by the National Insurance Institute to house and treat the mushrooming numbers of tuberculosis patients in rapidly-expanding Berlin.
Under the Soviet occupation, Beelitz-Heilstätten became a closed military zone, upgraded for use as the main hospital for Soviet troops stationed in the region, and for high-ranking GDR officials.

january 2014

SLEEPING BEAUTIES – ABANDONED CLASSIC CARS IN ARIZONA
A few photos from a trip to the U.S. last year.

december 2013

" INDUKTIVE KOPPLUNG II"
Great interactive TV installation/performance of Michel Bestmann alias Herr B. Manipulated black&white television transform an acoustic signal into an optical signal. With old telephone amplifiers the signal can be transferred again into an acoustic signal.
In practice my Anti-G-Suit.
> video

november 2013

For the last two months of the year a new hanging in the office with an example of my personal "nightmare" archive. Painting of an earlier period of my life.

october 2013

Things organized neatly

september 2013

BEAUTY, UGLINESS and SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN
Photos from a trip to the U.S. this year.

august 2013

HOW LONG DO CARS LAST?
Despite it's outward appearance, this 1956 Opel Olympia Caravan in my neighborhood is taxed, tested, insured, and ready to roll. The owner is a Professor for automotive engineering at the University in Berlin and bought the car in 1976. Just to see how a long a car would last with only the repairs needed for the notoriously strict German TÜV inspections and nothing else, until it has to be scrapped.

july 2013

The rough side of the workshop.

may 2013

MUSEUM OF CONTRADICTORY BEAUTIES (part I)
Starting a new series with some photos I recently got from Abrasha:
Power supply in front of the Anchor Steam Beer Brewery in San Francisco. In many cities in the US power lines are still running like this.
Abrasha is a metal artist who creates contemporary jewelry from unexpected combinations of precious and non-precious materials in forms well beyond traditional jewelry concepts.
Check out his website: >Abrasha

Power line of the Westinghouse Electric Corporation (1886) !

april 2013

The rough side of the workshop.

april 2013

UNDER PRESSURE...
Air compressor with "YLEM", a red plastic case with a collection of works by Luigi Colani. He became world famous with his eye-catching designs for cars, yachts, sanitation ceramics, and consumer goods. Colani derived many of his shapes from nature’s own unmistakable designs – he is firmly of the opinion that nature has already perfectly solved many of the tasks of design.

march 2013

My WUNDERKAMMER (part II)
Outboard motor from König Motorenbau.
Manufactured 1934 in Berlin.

february 2013

january 2013

New hanging in the office with a new example of my personal "nightmare" archive.

december 2012

november 2012

For the last two months of the year a new hanging in the office with an example of my personal "nightmare" archive. Painting of an earlier period of my life.

september 2012

My WUNDERKAMMER (Part I):

Still life without oxygene.
More about cabinets of curiosities:
Wunderkammer

may 2012

I received a bunch of perplexing photos by Cris Weer that shows the existential, deeply-sophisticated quality of street wiring in Thailand.

april 2012

This Lotus racing car in my neighbourhood reminds me of my former jobs to build moldings in pewter for an exclusive series of Mercedes racing car models.

january 2012

Season´s greetings!
Happy 2012!

december 2011

I stumbled upon this beautiful glass insulator in the south of France. Those insulators cap electrical wire connections to prevent dangerous sparks from catching the wooden poles or nearby structures on fire. Reuse a glass insulator by applying him to another electrical use: a custom-made glass lamp shade. Simply drill a hole through the top of the insulator and install a light bulb socket. From there, the possibilities are endless. Attach a long cable and chain to the top of the insulators and use them as hanging lights; use all one color or vary your colors for a stained glass chandelier look. If you slip the wires through a metal or plastic tube for stability, they can be used as porch lights.

november 2011

At the moment my friend the photographer Cris Weer works in Guangzhou, the metropolis in the south of China, famous for Zara Hadid's gorgeous spaceship Opera House and the stunning Canton Tower. Cris met the calligrapher Liang Yinyi in his little cabin. Take a look at this amazing wiring.

october 2011

Custom-made wiring...and it works!
Menton, France

september 2011

At a Lock Port in Berlin.