"Polar Bear" Painting

Gabriel Patti is a Chicago-based visual and sound artist with roots in jazz and improvisational art and music. He has exhibited artworks regionally and internationally. Patti often renders cityscapes and fleeting moments of urban life where memory and invention are merged together in vibrant paintings. He is compelled to serendipitous juxtapositions, impermanent or transitional moments, random interactions or chance encounters that shift awareness. Sunsets silhouetted by urban decay, strange stuff in alleys, wires and melting ice, burning or destroyed buildings, and smashed televisions are recurring subjects that have an ugly/beautiful aesthetic.
His sound paintings are a synesthetic approach to ambient noise and vision. Tones, noise and the general din are interpreted by color according to R.O.Y.G.B.I.V.; high frequencies = blue/violet, low frequencies = red. Walls and floor ‘show’ themselves when vibrated and streets and sidewalks are ‘found’ by sounds of transit. Familiar or recurring objects get more drawn out but buried under other sound/actions. These paintings are a stream of consciousness guided by the noise of the environment.
Another series is cellular phone masks where old sets are disassembled and reimagined on canvas. Like his collage work, they are an analog process to a digital concept melding the primitive and futuristic. Patti employs the same process with his calligraphic camouflage watercolors, hiding words in gestural marks.
Gabriel’s sense of absurd humor can been seen throughout his work and hopes the viewer will laugh at his paintings while enjoying subtleties of color and texture.