Big things - Drawing 4, 2023

Adrian Hobbs  

Adrian Hobbs lives and works in Sydney, Australia. His practice, which he calls "optical surrealism", consists of thinking of each work as a minimalist sketch where each detail carries meaning and echoes his "philosophy of chaos" inspired by thinkers Bergson and Deleuze: the edge is a threshold and not an end, the one is the multiple, contradiction creates meaning, and everything is interconnected.

To do this, he paints in oil on wooden panels with rounded cutouts, minimalist patterns and subtle trompe l'oeil that challenge the viewer.

“My paintings are the result of a blend of common pictorial strategies and a number of principles pervasive in how chaos is conceptualized in a range of academic traditions, primarily science, philosophy, and history.

These disciplines all illustrate how novelty, contradiction and coexistence, interconnectedness, continuity, repetition and difference, change, and the enduring presence and effect of invisible forces are all part of everyday life and indeed play an important role in its functioning."

He completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Hons) at the Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney, Sydney (2004) and a Master of Fine Arts at the Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney, Sydney (2015).

Recent exhibitions include Told Tales, Rachel Uffner Gallery, New York (2019), Color and Form, Robert Fontaine Gallery, Miami (2019), Cryptograms, Gallery 9, Sydney (2020), Rumori Dall'armaddio (Noises From The Closet), The Flat, Milan (2021).