Collection: David Barthold | into this world
November 17, 2022 – January 7, 2023
I spend a lot of time looking and thinking about what I call the skin of the city, the way surfaces, shapes, colors, and patterns overlap around us. I think of the ubiquity of commerce in American culture, advertising everywhere, the typography of signs and billboards vying for our attention and money, and the exuberant pornography of prosperity, acquisition, and disposal. Mingled with this is the connection to nature and natural materials and patterns in the carved stonework and cast iron on old buildings, bridges, and subways, vanishing under the advancing tide of decay, development, and gentrification. Lastly, the impulses, characters, and combinations of images brew in the imagination and emerge from the contemplation of all this.
I harness this riotous profusion on paper, on canvas, in wood and give it form. What begins as a print may become the surface of a sculpture. The curve of a bandsaw cut may call for a blush of color, a change in shape, or a spray of brushwork. There is no plan. I follow the prompting of the work as it progresses, and it is only resolved in the final combination of parts.
–David Barthold
PLANTHOUSE | 55 WEST 28TH STREET NEW YORK, NY 10001
Gallery Hours | Tuesday-Saturday 12-6 PM | Appointment Preferred
