David Richard Gallery is pleased to debut, the “Collage Paintings”, a new series of artworks by Christian Hires. This presentation of six paintings created during 2024 brings together several concepts into a single body of work.  Aesthetically, Hires combines Optical Art, hard edge painting, patterning, and collage. Theoretically, through a unique process he examines simulacra and challenges notions of reproduction through printing, photography, and lithography as a means to creating original, unique artworks.

Hires’ concept is simple, taking an analog image of any geometric or optical artwork and reproducing it through printing or xerographic means and assembling multiples of the same imagery. However, letting his process of hand-cutting the conjoined images into thin uniform horizontal strips and flipping certain strips per an algorithm then collaging them by hand dictates a more complex and unimaginable final composition than one might have expected. That image is then scanned with sophisticated equipment that combines the flexibility of printing with ink jets and Process Ink onto canvas but with the control of exposure, highlights, and contrast similar to photography to create the final painting. The ramifications of the process are complex and revisit many concepts grappled with throughout contemporary art in terms of originality, unique artworks, and what constitutes art (think of Marcel Duchamp) and produced by whom (à la Institutional Critique) as well as the fidelity of printing (consider Andy Warhol) and photography (recall Walter Benjamin’s “aura”) and the notions of the “death of painting” from Douglas Crimp in the 1980s.

Hires pushes the limits when enlarging the analog images at different points in the process, which can pixilate and fragment the imagery and introduce spots and imperfections that already existed in the original canvas or paper. Thus, the artist’s hand and decision making is very much present in this novel process. Every step can introduce process enhancements as well as mishaps and blemishes that are perpetuated and exposed. Thus, each composition and final painting is unique, not an edition or multiple, with its own “aura” that conflates decades of originality and process. The artist focuses on the complexity and high impact of these original compositions when viewed from a distance. Perfection is of less concern, and the imperfection is what adds the authenticity and patina of each artwork as Hires revisits an art historical movement, Op Art, that always had the mystique and allure of rigor, structure, and illusion.

Christian Hires' professional career began in the late 1970s. Inspired by the 1960s and 70s Op Art with the retinal and illusory properties, he has explored this genre more deeply in a scholarly and academic way. He has experimented with a variety of media, mostly acrylic and ink brushed and sprayed on a variety supports including canvas, wood, and paper and recently collaged. Most of his work has been with black and white but also uses colors.  He leverages vector geometry, patterning, repetition and shaped canvases to create eye-popping compositions to achieve viewer engagement then relies on the human eye and mind and their innate patten recognition skills, gestalt, and memory to complete the experience.

Artist Statement:
 
 “My intent is to research, develop, and present a confluence of mathematics, science and aesthetics in a unique visual experience. The interaction of points, lines, shapes and perimeter is the intended narrative. These images avoid representational, social or political commentary. They are my personal dialect within the language of vision.”