Haas Brothers: Sunset People

The Haas Brothers, celebrated for their distinctive fusion of art, design and technology, will take over the largest gallery at Jeffrey Deitch, Los Angeles with four new bodies of work. The new works will be a surprise to people who have followed the Haas Brothers. They have expanded their artistic approach with innovative computer modeling and the use of high-tech materials. They combine their reverence for traditional craft with a futuristic vision. In addition to its formal rigor, the work retains the whimsical quality that the artists are known for.

Tapestries

The first gallery will feature a group of exuberant tapestries filled with images of animals and plants. The imagery captures “elevated experiential moments” in the words of the artists, some from their travels and some from dreams. A tapestry teeming with alligators and snakes was inspired by a memorable fan boat trip through an alligator habitat.

Endless Paintings and Emergent Sculptures

The next gallery will present the Haas Brothers’ innovative Endless Paintings and a new body of Emergent Sculptures.

The Endless Paintings are inspired by the brothers’ nostalgic connection to the drawing program KidPix and their love of fantasy landscapes. The work merges a simplistic KidPix aesthetic with their own graphic style to create an infinite set of landscapes full of childlike wonder. Viewers are surprised with a new landscape at each encounter with the work.

The Emergent Sculptures are created with a combination of computer coding and traditional sculptural craft. They are a further exploration of the concept of emergence which has underpinned much of their material innovation such as their well-known ceramic works. The artists use a 3D computer graphics software tool to create physics simulations with forms inspired by the Wooden Wiggly Snake toy that they remembered from their childhood. They choreograph the initial movements that create the form, then relinquish control. The resulting shapes create themselves. Modernist form is fused with futuristic processes and materials. The sculptures are 3D printed in resin and surfaced with iridescent car paint. Hand blown glass pearls are affixed to the head. The Emergent Sculptures feel like abstracted animals. The artists consider them to be living things. With their emergent process, they try to capture the awe and wonder that nature inspires and to impress a nearly autonomous life force in the work that they put into the world.

Moon Towers

The final gallery features four Moon Towers, inspired by the original street lamps of the brothers’ native Austin, Texas. The lamps provided what felt like moon light in Austin neighborhoods before they were mostly replaced. There are now only six left in place and the brothers grew up half a block from one of the remaining lamps. In this body of work, the brothers play with their version of moon light as a medium. The audience is invited to create their own experience of “peace and weirdness” under the towers’ light.