Milan Peschel
A father with his two children in a quiet, peaceful landscape. The father’s gaze is directed at the viewer, while the children appear lost in their own thoughts. The son, dressed as Harry Potter, might be looking forward to a costume party at school or kindergarten. The girl could be observing an animal, a bird perhaps, or leaves being blown across the field by the autumn wind. All three are open-hearted, seem unafraid, feeling safe and protected.
When createPeace asked me whether art could define peace, I thought this is what peace could look like: I painted “Father with Children (in memoriam Hans Ticha)” on my iPad in August of this year. It shows me with my son and daughter.
Hans Fallada wrote a book of stories for his children. It’s called “Geschichten aus der Murkelei.” The copy that accompanied me throughout my childhood and youth contained illustrations by Hans Ticha, which I loved, as well as the stories themselves. One of the pictures showed a father with his children gazing out over a landscape from a hilltop or a mountain, saying goodbye to their childhood. We see them from behind, looking into the distance, and can imagine tears streaming down their cheeks (I felt the same way as an adult, reading the story from the Murkelei aloud). Fallada wrote the book during the darkest times ever experienced in Germany – 1938, shortly before the outbreak of World War II. NEVER AGAIN WAR – for us and those born after us.
Milan Peschel is an actor, director, and artist. He lives in Berlin and works in theaters there and in Germany.
“Father with Children (in memoriam Hans Ticha)”, 2025, digital artwork