Joe Roberts

Earth-1218

November 9 - December 21, 2018

For this exhibition, Roberts paints vivid, hyper-internalized landscapes that draw heavily on pop cultural references. The paintings utilize a crafted framework of natural, domestic, and urban environments, camouflaged in a fantastic veneer of magical realism. These environments all play a role in the world Roberts has created, and is constantly reinterpreting.

Roberts paints distinctive characters and eccentric communities that are outside the mainstream, while simultaneously appropriating popular icons such as: Scream, Anonymous, Mickey Mouse as he appears as The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, from the 1940 Disney film Fantasia, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, smiley face emoji, alien heads, as well as his dog Kevin. By presenting this specific recurring cast of cultural references as normal everyday characters, Roberts questions our standard structure of reality. These characters dictate a certain stability, while finding humor in our increasingly dark and mixed up world.

Roberts’ vibrantly toxic landscapes provoke complex insights into our nature of existence, typically accompanied by a sense of certainty that Knowledge is ultimately more relevant and real than the perceptions and beliefs we share in everyday life.