VESTIGIUM
Vestigium is Latin for trace or imprint.
The series explores what remains of a moment.
Places, people, encounters and seemingly insignificant moments leave traces within us, often without us noticing them at first. A particular colour, a certain quality of light, a landscape, a sound or a fleeting encounter can suddenly evoke a memory years later.
In Vestigium, these traces become colour, form and line.
The works emerge from the way memories settle within us and change over time. They are not attempts to reconstruct a specific moment or place. Instead, they translate the emotional residue of those experiences into abstract compositions.
A memory can change every time we return to it. What remains is not necessarily the exact image of a place or moment, but a feeling, a colour, a fragment of light, a particular atmosphere.
Vestigium is interested in precisely these fragments: what stays with us, what disappears, and what unexpectedly returns.
The series reflects the way the artist experiences her surroundings – through everyday life, encounters, travel, the urban environment of Hamburg and moments shared with the people around her. These experiences may remain unnoticed for a long time before resurfacing in the studio as colour, form or line.
The paintings are therefore less about depicting a memory than about making its trace tangible.
Art that makes memory tangible.
Biography
Dr. Anika Bornscheuer is a German abstract artist based in Hamburg’s vibrant Schanzenviertel, where she draws inspiration from the city’s layered urban atmosphere, often experienced through the eyes of her children.
Her early childhood was shaped by the creative environment of her grandparents’ farm. Her grandmother introduced her to the art of paper cutting, while she and her brother created their first sculptural works together.
Bornscheuer later attended art school in a small East Frisian town, where she also learned analogue photography and darkroom techniques. She continued exploring black-and-white photography during her Communication Design studies at Mainz University of Applied Sciences.
Her fascination with science eventually led her to study medicine in Münster, Hamburg, Israel, and Malta. The memories and impressions of these places continue to influence her artistic practice today. Her former work in radiology further deepened her interest in visual perception and the ways we interpret images.
Today, Bornscheuer creates abstract works that explore memory, perception, and the emotional traces left by places, encounters, and time.
She is permanently represented by Gallery Inyeon in Hamburg, was currently exhibiting at Glove Projects in Hamburg, and at the Stadtteilarchiv Ottensen.