RICHARD GALLERY TOMMY FITZPATRICK Landmark
DAVID
ISBN: 978-1-955260-64-0
Front Cover: Installation Tommy Fitzpatrick Landmark at David Richard Gallery
Title Page: Installation Tommy Fitzpatrick Landmark at David Richard Gallery
Back cover: IInstallation Tommy Fitzpatrick Landmark at David Richard Gallery
Tommy Fitzpatrick Landmark
February 14 - March 10, 2023
Published by:
David Richard Gallery, LLC, 526 West 26th Street, Suite 311, New York, NY 10001 www.DavidRichardGallery.com
212-882-1705 | 505-983-9555
DavidRichardGalleries1 DavidRichardGallery
Gallery Staff: David Eichholtz and Richard Barger, Managers
All rights reserved by David Richard Gallery, LLC. No part of this catalogue may be reproduced in whole or part in digital or printed form of any kind whatsoever without the express written permission of David Richard Gallery, LLC.
Artwork: © 2022 - Tommy Fitzpatrick
Catalogue: © 2023 David Richard Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Essay: by David Eichholtz
Catalogue Design: David Eichholtz and Richard Barger, David Richard Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Artwork © Tommy Fitzpatrick
Images by Yao Zu Lu
TOMMY FITZPATRICK Landmark
David Richard Gallery is pleased to present Landmark, an exhibition by Texas-based artist Tommy Fitzpatrick and his first solo presentation with the gallery in New York. The exhibition is comprised of ten of Fitzpatrick’s most recent paintings all dating from 2022 with sizes ranging from 70 x 50, 48 x 36, 32 x 24 and 24 x 18.
At a moment when the average rent prices in Manhattan just hit a record high of $5,142 1, Fitzpatrick’s paintings seem all the more relevant. Following in the conceptual footsteps of Dan Graham’s seminal photo essay Homes for America (1966-1967), Fitzpatrick’s paintings depict stylized domestic architecture, comprised of paired down forms and executed with brightly colored bold geometric planes. They are rendered in thick layers of paint, with deftly troweled edges of drastically differing depths of surface impasto, which may vary up to over a quarter of an inch. Abandoning the brush for the trowel Fitzpatrick’s distinct hulking surfaces are workman like and more strongly resemble the hand of a seasoned mason than of a conventional painter. As such, one cannot help but grapple with the physical presence of the paintings themselves when they are encountered for the first time in person. Yet it is Fitzpatrick’s stirring depiction of domestic architecture that linger with the viewer leaving them to ask themselves, what is a home, and ponder the question, what will be the fate of suburban vernacular architecture in the wake of the speculative housing crisis and the subsequent greater economic fallout across America.
Fitzpatrick has maintained a lifelong fascination with architecture since growing up in a Dallas suburb. He was highly impacted by his time assisting Frank Stella with an installation of a mural in Houston, it led to the development of a painting practice which moved towards geometric compositions rendered in electric hues and embraced modernism in both form and content. Modernism’s strive for utopian ideals propelled architecture and the arts simultaneously, and Fitzpatrick’s current paintings seem concerned with the aspects of Modernism which are most widely recognized for their virtue.
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“Things come and go, that is reflected in our architecture… Buildings that were once a remarkable feat of their time go out of style and are knocked down for the latest innovations. But there seems to be a quality within certain buildings and landmarks that acts as a universal commonality.2”
-Tommy Fitzpatrick
Of course, in the pursuit of a profound purpose Modernism has had to contend with the inevitable realities of its dystopic failures and the impact on society at large. Many of Fitzpatrick’s paintings depict variations on a colonial style known as the saltbox. These homes are not necessarily known for their architectural excellence, rather they exemplify qualities of what Dan Graham has recognized is the case with most postwar domestic architecture.
“They exist apart from prior standards of “good” architecture. They were not built to satisfy individual needs or tastes. The owner is completely tangential to the product’s completion. His home wasn’t really possessable in the old sense; it wasn’t ‘designed to last for generations’; outside of its immediate ‘here and now’ context it is useless, designed to be thrown away. Both architecture and craftsmanship as a value are subverted by dependence on simplified and easily duplicated techniques of fabrication and standardized modular plans.3”
- Dan Graham
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However, the dystopic truth endures that these structures remain a fundamental necessity, a facet of survival for a modern non-nomadic society. And even with their ubiquitous quality they remain quintessentially American in their form and imbued with primacy in the sociological function they provide.
1 Frank, Robert, Manhattan rents hit an all-time high in January, CNBC, Feb. 9, 2023, pp.1
2 Lloyd-Smith, Harriet, Painting architecture: Tommy Fitzpatrick’s fractured modernist visions, Wallpaper*, October 7, 2022
3 Graham, Dan, Homes for America (1966-1967), Otis Arts Institute of Los Angeles, 1975, pp. 22Since its inception in 2010, David Richard Gallery has produced museum quality exhibitions that feature Post WarDavid Eichholtz January 2023, New York
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10
Tommy Fitzpatrick Pilotis , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 50 x 40”
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Tommy Fitzpatrick City Lights , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 24 x 18”
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Tommy Fitzpatrick Landmark , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 70 x 50”
Tommy Fitzpatrick
Folding Structure , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel
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48 x 36”
Tommy Fitzpatrick Enclosure , 2022
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Acrylic on canvas over panel 60 x 48”
Tommy Fitzpatrick
Second Story , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel
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32 x 24”
Tommy Fitzpatrick Sloped Roof , 2022
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Acrylic on canvas over panel 24 x 18”
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Tommy Fitzpatrick House , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 48 x 36”
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Tommy Fitzpatrick Red Wedge , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 70 x 50”
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Tommy Fitzpatrick Monument , 2022
Acrylic on canvas over panel 32 x 24”
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About Tommy Fitzpatrick:
Fitzpatrick (b. 1969 in Dallas, Texas) currently lives and works in New Braunfels, Texas, and is a Professor and Head of Painting at the Texas State University in San Marcos. He earned his BA from The University of Texas at Austin, and his MFA from Yale University School of Art. He has won numerous awards including, the Winsor Newton Oil Bar Limited Prize from Yale University School of Art, New Haven, CT given in recognition of outstanding work in painting and printmaking. He has shown extensively throughout the United States and abroad, including over 20 solo exhibitions including Miro Gallery, San Jose, CA; Inman Gallery, Houston, TX; Johnson Gallery, Dallas, TX; Michael Schultz Gallery, Seoul, Korea; Charles Cowles Gallery, New York, NY; and Schultz Contemporary, Berlin, Germany. His paintings are in the public collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston as well as the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth.
DAVID RICHARD GALLERY
