Lari Pittman
08 Sep - 22 Oct 2006
Lari Pittman
Opening: 8 September 2006, 6 – 9 p.m.
Exhibition duration: 8 September – 22 October 2006
It is a great pleasure to announce the opening of the American artist Lari Pittman’s first solo exhibition at c/o – Atle Gerhardsen.
When Lari Pittman was attending art school in the 1970s, painting was widely considered to be outmoded, and had to play second fiddle to the new trends in conceptual art. The artist’s early works are conscious attempts at disturbing the very notion of „pure painting“ by use of collage and assemblage. By the mid 80s, these techniques fade out of his work, although a remnant of this collage character endures. Pittman’s paintings have multiple registers and levels of sensuality, weaving their own web of symbols. Each painting holds a complex construction of signs, it indeed forms a space in itself.
At c/o – Atle Gerhardsen, Lari Pittman will be presenting works employing various motifs and formal elements from non-European cultures. Birds hewn in forms reminiscent of African woodwork and fragments of human figures wearing folkloristic costumes populate the panels. In contrast to these are the dark, nightmarish compositions, in which egg-shaped forms swarm before architectural elements. The surface of the paintings seems to be laced with a fine braid of lines, stirring the memory of Max Ernst’s surreal forests. The synthesis is found in a large painting: it shows a spirited dance scene, in the swing of a typical Wild West saloon mood. And yet these egg forms have snuck into the scenery, taking the place of human heads. In the centre of the composition, the perfect Egg majestically holds the throne of unadulterated attention.
Pittman’s paintings create their own space; they adhere to their own rules. And yet there seems to be a space behind them, something lying beneath the visible surface level, generating a tangible pulsating movement.
Lari Pittman was born in 1952 in Los Angeles, and now teaches drawing and painting at the University of California, Los Angeles. In 2006, Lari Pittman’s works will be included in the exhibition Los Angeles Art Scene 1955-1985 in the Centre Pompidou, Paris. His works will also be shown in the group show Couples Discourse (Cat.) in the Palmer Museum of Art at Pennsylvania State University, as well as in the exhibition los angeles / mexico: complexities and heterogeneity in the Jumex Collection, Mexico City.
For further information or visuals, please contact Maike Fries, c/o – Atle Gerhardsen: Tel.: +49-30-69 51 83 41, Fax: +49-30-69 51 83 42, E-mail: office@atlegerhardsen.com or visit our website at http://www.atlegerhardsen.com.
c/o – Atle Gerhardsen
Holzmarktstraße 15-18
S-Bahnbogen 46
10179 Berlin
© Lari Pittman
Courtyard, 2006
Cel vinyl and aerosol enamel on gessoed canvas over wood panel
259,1 x 218,4 cm (102 x 86 inches)
Courtesy c/o - Atle Gerhardsen, Berlin
Opening: 8 September 2006, 6 – 9 p.m.
Exhibition duration: 8 September – 22 October 2006
It is a great pleasure to announce the opening of the American artist Lari Pittman’s first solo exhibition at c/o – Atle Gerhardsen.
When Lari Pittman was attending art school in the 1970s, painting was widely considered to be outmoded, and had to play second fiddle to the new trends in conceptual art. The artist’s early works are conscious attempts at disturbing the very notion of „pure painting“ by use of collage and assemblage. By the mid 80s, these techniques fade out of his work, although a remnant of this collage character endures. Pittman’s paintings have multiple registers and levels of sensuality, weaving their own web of symbols. Each painting holds a complex construction of signs, it indeed forms a space in itself.
At c/o – Atle Gerhardsen, Lari Pittman will be presenting works employing various motifs and formal elements from non-European cultures. Birds hewn in forms reminiscent of African woodwork and fragments of human figures wearing folkloristic costumes populate the panels. In contrast to these are the dark, nightmarish compositions, in which egg-shaped forms swarm before architectural elements. The surface of the paintings seems to be laced with a fine braid of lines, stirring the memory of Max Ernst’s surreal forests. The synthesis is found in a large painting: it shows a spirited dance scene, in the swing of a typical Wild West saloon mood. And yet these egg forms have snuck into the scenery, taking the place of human heads. In the centre of the composition, the perfect Egg majestically holds the throne of unadulterated attention.
Pittman’s paintings create their own space; they adhere to their own rules. And yet there seems to be a space behind them, something lying beneath the visible surface level, generating a tangible pulsating movement.
Lari Pittman was born in 1952 in Los Angeles, and now teaches drawing and painting at the University of California, Los Angeles. In 2006, Lari Pittman’s works will be included in the exhibition Los Angeles Art Scene 1955-1985 in the Centre Pompidou, Paris. His works will also be shown in the group show Couples Discourse (Cat.) in the Palmer Museum of Art at Pennsylvania State University, as well as in the exhibition los angeles / mexico: complexities and heterogeneity in the Jumex Collection, Mexico City.
For further information or visuals, please contact Maike Fries, c/o – Atle Gerhardsen: Tel.: +49-30-69 51 83 41, Fax: +49-30-69 51 83 42, E-mail: office@atlegerhardsen.com or visit our website at http://www.atlegerhardsen.com.
c/o – Atle Gerhardsen
Holzmarktstraße 15-18
S-Bahnbogen 46
10179 Berlin
© Lari Pittman
Courtyard, 2006
Cel vinyl and aerosol enamel on gessoed canvas over wood panel
259,1 x 218,4 cm (102 x 86 inches)
Courtesy c/o - Atle Gerhardsen, Berlin