Herrmann in his studio
KURT HERRMANN
Kurt Herrmann: “Crispy Clouds is my new show of Color Bombs at Houska Gallery. The Color Bombs have always been about speaking the language of color. But this new series pushes into more atmospheric territory while still grounded and guided by shape and color. The title Crispy Clouds hints at this evolution by straddling the boundary between space and edge. I’m interested in the aura or glow that can play against the structural scaffolding that loosely holds the composition in place. There is also an iconography emerging in some of the works. Often these shapes reference the landscape, or something anthropomorphic. But ultimately it is simply about the color and how it can generate pure emotion with no reference to anything other than the feeling itself. In describing my work I am always drawn back to music, specifically jazz. Nobody asks what a Charlie Parker solo on the saxophone means. You either feel it, or you don’t”.
*More insight into Kurts Color Bomb Series: “Color does not need to represent anything other than itself. It is universal yet nothing is more personal. And that’s how I present these paintings. I’m distilling something that struck me, but the interpretations and feelings they provoke in others can be infinite. I want the Color Bombs to radiate across the room but to also whisper quietly beside you. I want a big sound and silence. Many of my shapes, forms, and colors have been extracted from the mountains of Pennsylvania where I live and work, but I also sample bits and pieces of memories and places I’ve never been. There are trunks of trees, winter skies, deer legs, the pink from a summer watermelon, and Greek islands I’ve always wanted to see. These are some of the sparks that start a painting but they are not the whole story. Even if a painting was initially inspired by something exotic, or an extremely personal event on the other side of the planet, all my work is filtered through my studio in the hills of Appalachia. The colors, silence, space, seasons, landscape, and even the rednecks impact everything I make. It’s inescapable”.
Kurt Herrmann (b. 1972, Lock Haven, USA) is a painter from the Appalachian Mountains of Pennsylvania who does both figurative and abstract work, but above all is a colorist at heart. Two of his recent shows were featured in Time Out Chicago and the Philadelphia Inquirer, with recent shows in Tasmania (Penny Contemporary), New Orleans (Octavia Gallery), Auckland (12 Gallery), Philadelphia (James Oliver Gallery), and Sydney (Traffic Jam Galleries). His work is in prominent collections across the US, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe, including Capitol One Corporate Headquarters (Wilmington, DE), Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (New York, NY), and Temple University (Philadelphia, PA). Recent commissions include large work for Hotel Del Coronado (San Diego, CA), and a line of beer labels for Elk Creek Café + Aleworks (Millheim, PA). Although his exhibition schedule is increasingly international, Herrmann’s rural Pennsylvania roots continue to influence his work.
