Thomas Zipp Paintings, Exhibitions at the Saatchi Gallery

Thomas Zipp develops fantasy scenarios verging on the eccentric and theatrical. Garnering inspiration from art history, politics, philosophy, and popular culture, Zipp uses unlikely combinations of sources and genres to trigger a sense of familiarity within the absurd. In a composition of two canvases and a drawing, E-Licht is sparsely hung with museum authority. Balancing a large abstraction above a painting of a zeppelin, Zipp uses the ambient qualities of formalism to create fictional space, the utopian aspirations of modernism doubling as a set of subterranean misadventure.Most of the nine artists come from southern Germany. They come to grips with the idea of narrative art, though without any debt to it. They are interested in the concept of the icon, in the true sense of the term, that of representative painting. The images in "Painting on the Roof" embody a nomadic character that constitutes their force with respect to other experimentation with painting of this generation. The new often appears in the guise of the old. For this reason, these figurative works possess a symbolic, realistic, calligraphic lightness. But their foundation is formed by the pursuit of archetypes and the visionary gaze at the invisible that always permeated the painting of the 20th century, starting with Kandinsky.

Thomas Zipp’s Der Schlaf IV fabricates a surreal landscape. Using each element of his installation as a referential prop, Zipp weaves together a narrative flirting between reality and fantasy. The painting, depicting a vast rugged landscape, is dwarfed by a foreboding sexuality, and the framed and censored note ends in a trail of tiny punctures. Creating a sense of clinical detachment, Zipp’s installation is accompanied by a large chandelier. Made from fluorescent tubing, its design follows an illogical mathematical proportion, reinforcing the irrational within the pursuit of lucidity.Zipp creates a parallel world envisioning a precarious future-fiction based on revisionist past. Schwartze Ballons is a nine-part installation comprised of paintings, drawings, and sculpture. Central to the piece is a large black structure. Ominous and strange, its ballooning form connotes a malevolent technology, stealth-like in its dead weight. The accompanying abstract drawings suggest scientific inventions that are equally playful and sinister. Painted portraits complete the scene with b-movie flair: dead zombie-like leaders with rivets for eyes add a subtext of evil, both spellbinding and humorous.