Richard Woods and Gao Hang at Proyecto REME, Barcelona

The exhibition “Home Screen” offers a unique look at the interaction between the work of English artist Richard Woods and the Chinese artist based in the United States Gao Hang, two figures whose work invites us to reflect on the limits of representation and space.

On the one hand, Richard Woods uses an aesthetic based on geometric patterns and the repetition of forms that evoke popular architecture, transforming common surfaces into playful and reflective expressions. His use of vibrant colors and the distortion of visual patterns with references to Pop Art and Minimalism place his work between the ornamental and the structural. Woods’ works, loaded with an ironic sense of humor, challenge our perception of the function of objects and the space we inhabit, taking architectural functionality to a new artistic dimension.

On the other hand, Gao Hang’s work is influenced by his years of classical painting studies and his contemporary, critical and experimental vision. The artist’s fascination with the culture of video games and digital graphics is made visible through the use of bright colours and the technique of airbrushing. The work “Let me think”, for example, portrays an anti-classic figure positioning, with the face being pushed to the edge, to imply a movement in video gaming where you can always move your screen to adjust this figure back to classic composition: to the center.

By putting the pieces of both artists in dialogue, the exhibition reveals how each, from their cultural and stylistic perspective, plays with the elements of geometric abstraction and visual representation. While Woods’ work is based on the reconfiguration of that which is common, using patterns that can be familiar and recognizable, Hang’s work offers a stimulating and provocative experience. Both artists manage to question our notions of space, both inside and outside of the canvas.

In “Home Screen,” the contrasts between the works of Richard Woods and Gao Hang not only reveal the richness of their respective artistic universes, but also propose a visual conversation that explores the interaction between tradition and modernity, the abstract and the figurative, humor and reflection.