Poetic Contradiction

Gallery70 has the pleasure to present a series of new mid size oil paintings by the American artist Max Dunlop. It is his first solo show in Albania and it is called  "Poetic Contradiction"  The opening event will take place at Gallery70 in Rruga Abdi Toptani  on June 22 , 2023 from  19:00 to 21:00. 
“You are dreaming right now. It is not possible for you to wake up from that dream (i.e. to stop experiencing the simulacrum of yourself in a world as real), because outside of a dream you don´t exist. Your generator function runs in a physical universe, but you do not.”
-Joscha Bach, Cognitive Scientist at Humboldt-Universität
Representational painting is often seen as an inherent contradiction. The four dimensions of reality are expressed within the two dimensions of the picture plane. A brush stroke presents itself to the viewer as a simultaneous paradox, a pure physical material, and an illusion of external reality. However, human perception of reality is much more in line with the act of painting than we previously believed because our mental models of existence are contradictory fabrications themselves.
Contemporary research and developments in the fields of Cognitive Science, Artificial Intelligence, and Computer Vision have provided both new insights and a new vocabulary for  understanding human perception. The physical reality of the universe is far too complex for us to experience. There is too much data for the human brain to perceive or process and yet our mental models of reality are more than just data compressions of base reality. Our models  are subjective, fluid, and flawed. They are poetic contradictions. My work focuses on investigating and amplifying the multiple layers of contradictions  that make up the human experience. The imagery is assembled using a mixture of references from art history, human history, memory, and direct observation. My paintings are symbols that represent our broader cultural and historical environment. They are real and imagined, they exist in the past and the present, and they criticize the history that they represent.
Primarily though, these are paintings. They exist where abstraction and representation vibrate against each other, and the viewer is provided with an opportunity to project their own experiences into the ambiguity.
-Max Dunlop

This is an exhibition in the framework of the artist exchange program with JanineBeanGallery in Berlin 
For high resolution images and interviews with the artist please contact press@gallery70.art