ROBERT BERMAN GALLERY is pleased to present "Bad News" - a solo show from Los Angeles artist Ellwood T. Risk.
Transforming pistol targets into art since 2002 – Risk widens the scope of his bulls-eye for this survey of global affairs with the use of front pages from the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. Bad News launches what will be a long running series of newsprint based works made from both publications collected by the artist over the last twelve years.
In this particular collection – the whimsical cartoonish incarnations of the targets belie the serious nature of the headlines below. The layering of stained newsprint, targets and stenciling captured beneath a slick resin finish provide a depth of field for the artist to convey his signature political and social commentary with a sharp tongue and quick wit.
Citing Sigmar Polke, Hunter S. Thompson and William S. Burroughs as influences, Risk is a self taught, internationally exhibited artist whose work is a mainstay on the television landscape – most notably on Showtime’s CALIFORNICATION and HBO’s SIX FEET UNDER.
“There are few more potent, less obscure images than the target… Ellwood. T. Risk is making a statement, but it’s a statement he wants us to feel even sooner than he wants us to know… Finally, Risk insists we get beyond the callous distance that has abetted the moral and cultural, not to mention political decline of our country.” - Peter Frank (November 2007)
