Christopher Martin Hoff offers up striking urban realism. He uses the linear, geometric patterns of the city to bisect and dissect the landscape. In some of his more experimental efforts he intentionally leaves areas of the image unpainted or merely filled in with white, leaving the various man made constructs completely cut off from their context, emphasizing its' dislocation within the natural world. This is not a particularly uplifting view but he does manage to find in it a fascination with the random, one might ironically organic, complexity that accumulates around us in our frenetic efforts to build, and mark, and connect. Looking at the urban environment through his eyes, one begins to realize that while each detail may have been the result of human planning, the whole is a product of chaos. And in that sense it is very much alive.
You can check out his website (
www.christopherhoff.com) although the images (which you can zoom in on) are constrained in fairly small format. There's more at
Linda Hodges gallery which is how I came across it, but the best place to look through his work online is at
www.steveherrmanns.com
And thanks to that last website you REALLY ought to click on these images to view them larger.
"Floating World 6" • Oil & blue graphite on linen • 41 x 71 cm
"Floating World 3: Always" • Oil & blue graphite on canvas • 46 x 91 cm
"Only" • Oil on linen • 51 x 51 cm
"Moment Frame 2"
"Moment Frame 4"
"Alley and a Dress" • Oil on linen • 76 x 102 cm
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