Sirrenberg finds artistic home in Aiken, ‘not moving anymore’

STAFF PHOTO BY BILL BENGTSON Gisela Sirrenberg, shown here at the Aiken Center for the Arts, has a background including service as a stewardess for Lufthansa and years in the equine industry, focusing on carriage horses. Her artistic efforts are largely on jewelry and three-dimensional painting on canvas.

STAFF PHOTO BY BILL BENGTSON Dozens of creations from the mind and hands of Gisela Sirrenberg are among those regularly on display at Aiken Center for the Arts. The artist is a native of Germany and has seen much of the world by way of her years as a stewardess for Lufthansa.

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BY BILL BENGTSON bbengtson@aikenstandard.com

She’s been around the world more than a few times, with a background that includes 17 years as an airline stewardess, and Gisela Sirrenberg is pleased to have landed in Aiken, where she’s largely known as an instructor at Aiken Center for the Arts.

She’s also the creative force behind an exhibit on display through Thursday at the arts center.

“I do acrylic and resin pouring. ... It’s a process of mixing acrylic paints with Floetrol,” she said, referring to a latex-based paint additive often used by house painters for special effects. “My specialty is, I put a coat of resin over it, and that gives it a very high gloss, and you can insert all kinds of little objects, like I love to put crystals in it, which stick to the canvas, also – crystals or all kinds of stones or seashells. You name it. You can do so many different things.”

The concept of “many different things” applies easily to Sirrenberg.

A native of Germany, she grew up in the Dusseldorf area and set a course that would make her fluent in three languages.

In high school, she took a year off from traditional studies and advanced her education at a private academy in Bournemoth, a town in south-central England. Later years found her studying in Spain, earning a degree in Spanish from the University of Barcelona.

“When I was 21, I started to work for the airline, as a flight attendant, so I flew for Lufthansa for 17 years, and then traveled all over the world. I was on long-range 15 out of those 17 years, so I got to see the world and I got many different impressions and ... had a wonderful time,” she recalled.

Many miles later, she moved to the U.S. in 1983 and wound up touching down in Aiken around 2004-05, having experienced life in a variety of locales around the eastern U.S.

“My husband was a horse trainer for carriage horses, and that’s how we came to America,” she said, sharing some memories of Walter Karl Sirrenberg, a German native who died in 2015.

“He sold his last, very successful team of horses to a guy in America, and he didn’t know how to handle them, so we came with them, and I’ve been in the country now for 40 years. ... When we finally came to Aiken, I said, ‘This is it. I’m not moving anymore. I love this place, and we’re staying here.’”

“I dropped all my horsey things and went into the arts ... late in my life, actually. I now also teach my techniques and stuff at the arts center.”

Her techniques in working with acrylic and resin came with help from a relatively modern resource, after the idea of “pouring your paint” came to her attention.

“I said, ‘Well, that sounds interesting,’ and then I did some research on YouTube, and that’s where I basically learned all the different techniques, so there was nobody around to show me except for YouTube, so I taught myself, and that’s how I ended up with this.”

“(My husband) sold his last, very successful team of horses to a guy in America, and he didn’t know how to handle them, so we came with them, and I’ve been in the country now for 40 years. ... When we finally came to Aiken, I said, ‘This is it. I’m not moving anymore. I love this place, and we’re staying here.’”

Gisela Sirrenberg