Alexander Strohte paints the places he is longing for, or rather the water, that makes these places unique, and his desire is not fleeting, but very precise. He paints the Wolfgangsee, the bays of the Côte d’Azur, of Normandy or the North Sea, however not in showing them in a figurative way, but in distilling their character, reducing them to their essence. These seascapes are only insofar abstract as emotions, feelings and atmospheres are abstract.
Each of these paintings is a distillate of the waters at a certain location, with all of their colors, their vibrations, the dynamics of their currents – and all of the moods that are palpable at this place.
The engaging transparency of David Hockneys pools is missing here: Strohte is looking at his subject from the edge, and with a lot of respect. The complexity of his brushwork and his application of the paint corresponds to the complexity of his emotions. These waters have depth and deepness, they lead a life of their own. And this is what distinguishes them.

-Thomas Plaichinger