Richard Galling
Protein Culture
The Green Gallery East
July 9 – August 13, 2022
Opening reception: Saturday, 9 July 2022 5-7pm
The Green Gallery is pleased to present Milwaukee-based artist Richard Galling’s fifth show at the gallery, Protein Culture, a series of new paintings.
The work synthesizes graphic motifs, symbols, nods to the romantic and impressionistic dashings, from Galling’s previous work. These new paintings also bring in text and simple figurative imagery, utilized in ways that feel both playful yet absurd.
The paintings are to some extent emergent and based in process. Casual off-hand gestures often get things moving. Determinant choices are made to calibrate color and composition, followed by the overlay of other visual information.
The work negotiates what feels like an absurd present where representational structures seem to fluctuate on a whim. Given variables present in these paintings, affect and perform, often offsetting and subverting one’s initial reading. The slippery nature of language and representation are nothing new but the pace at which it (d)evolves seems momentarily keyed in.
In these paintings, visual and textual language posit a kind of false hope or cruel optimism. They present visual situations that are intentionally riddled with some confusion. Perhaps the paintings use absurdity and play as a way out. These strategies help us to redirect our understanding of representation at a time when such feels constantly over-managed.