The shape immediately leads to Wolfgang Mussgnug’s real topic: light. The shape is defined by the clear glass, but only the reflection of the light makes the outlines visible – the absolute transparency of the clear glass needs the light to become visible. The magical power of the material’s transparency is put in a vibrating motion by the contrasting monochrome coloured areas. The passionate and energized luminosity of the pasty and intense primary colours – in particular blue and red – is an impulsive contrast to the soft transparency of the glass. The shapes and the very emotional coloured fields, which softly cling to the glass, have no straight contours, since they follow the laws of the heated glass – Mussgnug gives the optical characteristics of the glass all opportunities to develop.
Wolfgang Mussgnug only needs few accents, like circles and lines, to create pictorial compositions which are influenced by the traditional Japanese and Chinese principles of composition. His compositions are full of tension – rhythms generate powerful dynamism.
Despite the reduced image composition, the shapes exude musical vitality of subtle expressiveness. In compositions balanced in harmony or full of tension the individual elements encounter friction, generating a lot of power. The expressiveness and vitality of the colours demonstrate the openness of the concetto, searching the balance between the unreal immateriality of the glass’ transparency and the opacity of the colour. – Manifesting timeless calm and balance, the objects are at the same time archaic and modern. The timelessness of Wolfgang Mussgnug's art seems to have its origin in a dialogue between the past and the future, old cultures and futuristic visions.
Texts written in a cryptic language are engraved in the surface with a diamond. The beholder will not be able to decrypt these writings, but Mussgnug uses them to note significant moments, like in a diary, in his own cryptograph. Due to their textile structure they seem to become an ornament, covering the composition like a bobbin lace in a delicate, repetitive, graphic pattern.
