Martin Wittfooth

Martin Wittfooth - Isle of the Dead (Second Version)

Statement Bio

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Artist's Statement

Martin Wittfooth's work stems from a personal desire to process and reflect on the increasingly haywire relationship, confusion, and general detachment – both of experience and understanding – that the modern-day industrialized world has with its surrounding environment, and the forced and uneasy assimilations that take place when the two inevitably meet. By removing the human figure from the works and instead portraying nature in man-made or manufactured settings, Wittfooth's work forces us to be impartial observers to these scenes and to process the tension within them as mere witnesses rather than active participants. Much of this work deals with violence, disquiet, chaos and collapse, but not entirely absent in these works is also the suggestion of hope and the presence of beauty.

Wittfooth's art draws both technical and conceptual inspiration from a wide variety of classical painters, but in their subject matter and themes his paintings are concerned with addressing a broad range of contemporary issues.

Artist's Bio

Martin Wittfooth lives and works in New York, New York.

Selected Recent Exhibition: 2011 – Suggestivism, Grand Central Museum, Los Angeles, California. 2010 – Gardens, solo exhibition, Roq la Rue Gallery, Seattle, Washington; Tempest, solo exhibition, CoproGallery, Santa Monica, California; Group show, PULSE Art Fair Miami / Lyons Wier Gallery New York, Wynwood Miami, Florida; Survey Select, Wonderhaus, San Diego, California; Art Shack, Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, California; Art From the New World, Bristol's City Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol, UK. 2009 – Babylon, solo exhibition, Yves Laroche, Galerie d’Art, Montreal, Quebec; Don't Wake Daddy IV, Feinkunst Krueger, Hamburg, Germany; Blab! Art Show and book release, Copro / Nason Gallery, Santa Monica, California; Beach Blanket Bingo, Jonathan Levine Gallery, New York, New York; Lush Life, Roq la Rue Gallery, Seattle, Washington; Overdose: Hi Fructose Magazine Invitational Group Show, Copro / Nason Gallery, Santa Monica, California; Pulse Art Fair New York, juried art fair, Pulse Art Fair, Copro / Nason Gallery, New York, New York. 2008 – Sandcastles in the Tide, solo exhibition, Copro / Nason Gallery, Santa Monica, California. 2005 – Melting Season, solo exhibition, La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles, California.