Library Street Collective is pleased to present an exhibition with Houston-based artist Paul Kremer titled Spring and opening Saturday March 4th. Featured in the show is a new body of paintings dependent on experiments in tool-making. The apparent simplicity of the works belies the complexity of Kremer’s artistic process, which involves extensive planning and cyclical methodologies that blur the line between beginning and end.
For each of his paintings, Kremer creates dozens of studies, often starting on the computer with a burst of exploratory drawings, which are then narrowed down to smaller selections for execution as color studies done on paper or smaller canvases. The featured body of work takes this process one step further: using AI ChatGPT, Kremer programmed a set of digital tools that allowed him to manipulate inputs of shapes and palettes into rapidly-changeable randomized compositions, which could then themselves be selected, adjusted, and manipulated into different variations based on one theme. Excited by the outcome, he collaborated with fellow artist and programmer Leander Herzog to expand these tools into an entire suite of personalized art-making software. The result is a unified but endlessly variable set of possibilities for future bodies of work, based on a process that allows for both creation and re-use, as well as both generation and derivation.
Insinuated by their titles, the “Blooms” are abstract representations of flowers, and their origin is influenced by Henri Matisse’s découpés, a monumental series of work characterized by bold uses of color and organic, reduced forms. Matisse's use of paper cut-outs in his later career allowed him to experiment with color and composition by easily shifting pieces around to find the perfect arrangement, building upon his existing visual language. Kremer mimics this process but through contemporary technology, illuminating the timeless conceptual foundation upon which his practice is built. As was true for the late artist, color is a crucial component of Kremer’s practice and the driver in achieving the essential degree of visual impact: “Matisse's careful choreographing of palettes, his ability to convey a distinctive feeling with bold objects on flat planes of color, and the relentless positivity that emerges from his work have all been an inspiration to me. His color combinations are incomparably beautiful and surprising—even colors that don't seem to work together, in every case, do.” Kremer underscores his admiration for Matisse's ability to “make simplicity look simple,” a mastery that mirrors his own operative efforts.
Spring sheds light on Kremer’s often curtained tendency to alternate between the physical and the digital. Beyond giving people a positive feeling when encountering the works, the artist hopes his audience will take the time to consider their process of creation, and how—in Kremer’s case, with the development of new tools—one’s own ideas can serve as catalysts for countless more.
Paul Kremer: Spring is on view from March 4 through April 26, 2023 at Library Street Collective.
