Berlin-based Contemporary Fine Arts gallery is currently exhibiting the work of Art:21 Season 2 artist Raymond Pettibon. No Title, 2008 includes a large wall drawing in addition to video and works on paper composed with ink, colored pencil, and watercolor.
Pettibon‚Äôs comic strip narratives address a wide variety of topics in both art and socio-politics, ranging from sexuality to film, sports, and U.S. foreign policy. His incisive critiques are rooted in the 1970s punk scene from which his art emerged, having produced numerous album covers for the label SST Records. Pettibon’s brother, Greg Ginn, was a founding member of the seminal band Black Flag.
The artist’s usage of text does not take an explanatory role, but rather deliberately confuses in its ambiguous and ironic mode of storytelling. Often incorporating humor, they represent Pettibon’s personal viewpoints that he has written himself or borrowed from the likes of Flaubert, Proust, and Faulkner. Other figures that frequently appear in his work are surfers, baseball players, Gumby, Superman, and Charles Manson.
Raymond Pettibon’s sixth solo exhibition at Contemporary Fine Arts runs through April 26. For further information, please visit the gallery website.
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