Shows

Dangerous Ideas, charcoal on paper, 42" x 80" Fall of Icarus, charcoal on paper, 42" x 80"

"Illig has a good handle on how to carry out monumental work," Westword critic Michael Paglia once said. And, here is more proof!

Peter Illig's recent show at Spark Gallery, titled "DIALOG:21" marked the importand debut of his MODULAR DIALOG SERIES. The show featured 21 new black and white oil paintings arranged as a matrix of metaphorical images inside a giant, stunning red rectangle. The image matrix invites the viewer to make connections and interpretations which may be obvious or enigmatic, complementary or contrasting, but always thought provoking. Once again, Peter explored new artistic formats to create something that is distinctly HIS STYLE, yet unlike ANYTHING he had done before!

This show marked the debut of Peter's new "Modular Dialog" series, which will be ongoing. The paintings (each 14" x 14") are designed to fit together in an infinite variety of ways, creating new dialogs, new narratives, with each layout. More modular paintings are being created, so that anyone may create his or her own grid, all at once, or gradually build it over time, as new pieces are produced.

"... Over the past decade, Illig has made a reputation creating contemporary representational paintings and drawings. Like other realists, he attempts to impart something new into the age-old tradition. In his case, he makes obvious references to pop culture, in particular the movies. And, just like in the movies, Illig's pieces feature juxtapositions of contrasting visual information to lay out some kind of narrative.

"In the past couple of years, Illig carried out his ideas with charcoal drawings that were more than sixty feet long. He's shifted gears for the Spark show; Instead of doing continuous compositions of interlocking scenes on rolls of paper, he's done "The Meaning of Sensation," which is made up of 21 individual 14 x 14" panels, and is part of his ongoing "Modular Dialog" series.

"Interestingly, Illig achieves the same affect as before, because he's assembled the small panels so that they function as parts of one piece. He also envisions the arrangements changing, so that the stories change, too. Here he's lined up depictions of a young woman on a phone, a TV with its screen shattered and a collapsing chimney (pictured in Westowrd article), among some 18 others."

Peter's biggest show of the Summer 2005 was......THE LOGIC OF DREAMS... A solo show in the front gallery at Pirate (3659 Navajo in Denver)! The images above and below are both part of the giant 60+-foot LOGIC OF DREAMS piece.

Peter's show took place during the HISTORIC reconfiguration of the Denver gallery, so on the final weekend, we hosted THE RECONSTRUCTION: DECONSTRUCTION PARTY!

After more than 23 years in its current location, Pirate: A Contemporary Art Oasis underwent some major changes, as construction crews moved walls, doorways and more to reconfigure the space that had become a familiar part of Denver's art landscape.

Creating THE LOGIC OF DREAMS

A year in the making, Peter's epic epic drawing began as an idea, and evolved into a series of tiny thumbnail sketches. Each sketch was developed over time, and eventually drawn onto the final work.

The 61.5-ft drawing begins with a young woman sleeping and ends with her waking up the next day. What happens in between is Peter Illig's own brand of "neo-pop surrealism" magic...a look into the subconcious mind, where random images collide and it's up to the dreamer to interpret meanings and suggestions.

From Plus Gallery website:

Recent years have produced variants of realism with combinations of sharply simplified, hard-edge abstractions and subject matter taken from photographic or photo-inspired sources. It is the simple factualism and flat insipid reality of the photographed image which provide the prototypes for this new, contemporary realism, rather than the traditional example of realistic painting. Both its intense fidelity to photographic or real-life models and an equally insistent formal structuring identify the new realism as an art pushed to extremes.

Falling deeply into this category, and certainly no stranger to the contemporary art-scene in Denver, Peter Illig makes his + gallery debut alongside Morgan as the "Future Tense" of the exhibition. Illig unveils new works that very well adhere to a contemporary realist ideology, while taking the artist's exploration of medium and scale to dizzying new heights. The grandiose, often surreal narratives have been replaced by a semantic that is fundamentally rooted with his past pursuits but now leading with a philosophical edge. Here Illig is implying a renewed look at a culture cultivated by media and science. For the artist, the cult of technology has certainly changed our lives, but the remnants of humanity never drift far away.

Science and rationality, once held up as the solution to all of mankind's problems, are questioned more than ever. Illig's symbolic take challenges the viewer into retrospection. The work exhibits a fictitious yet familiar stance on how scientific ideologies and technology have affected our culture. Utilizing slices of common imagery taken from Hollywood and other media sources Illig is able to effectively convey these influences to his audience.

"Evolution is rooted in our minds and bodies. If we can balance logic, passion and humanity (as represented in Star Trek by Spock, Kirk and McCoy), we can achieve great things." - P. Illig

The work is less a narrative as it is a fragmented delineation of thought. In comparison to his last exhibition at Pirate in 2004 where the artist implemented charcoal, he returns to paint as his primary medium, yet choosing to pursue a monochromatic palate. Creating a noir like atmosphere through black and white colors, Illig displays a beautiful, mysterious, and compelling array of imagery that will beguile thoughts contrary to his aim.

PRESS NOTES FROM THIS SHOW:

ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS: "Ivar Zeile and Gilbert Barrera, of + Gallery, have paired Morgan's work with new paintings by Peter Illig. Illig is looking to different worlds in "Future Tense," including allegorical approaches to such venerable concerns as The Myth of Science, The Crisis of Painting and The End of Language (a particularly tense moment when a man tries to stop dozens of sign letters from tumbling into a river).

Illig's last piece, at Pirate, was a megawork in charcoal on paper that created a near-surround. Here, he is working in more specific confines, but in black and white that adds a documentary air to the subjects at hand." - Mary Volz Chandler

WESTWORD: "There are so many talented representational painters in the area, it's a wonder that no curator of some local museum or art center has thought to put a group of them together in a show. The next best thing might be a duet, which is essentially what's shoehorned into the front space at + Gallery (2350 Lawrence Street, 303-296-0927). Jenny Morgan: First Person occupies two of the walls, and Peter Illig: Future Tense the other two.

Illig, who teaches art at Rangeview High School, has exhibited his work around the area for the past ten years. This is his first outing at +, and the small solo comprises only four pieces: a drawing and three paintings.

Illig's style is decidedly neo-pop, and there's definitely a relationship between his work and that of pioneering pop artist James Rosenquist. But there's also a gritty, noir-ish quality to Illig's work that recalls the covers of pulp novels. (Come to think of it, Rosenquist plumbed those same depths for inspiration.) Illig typically cuts up the picture, allowing different scenes in different scales to collide in the same piece, but sometimes, as with "The End of Language" (above), an oil on canvas, he uses a single, bizarre scenario." - Michael Paglia

Summer 2004

Pirate: A Contemporary Art Oasis

Shadows of a Dream

Before "The Logic of Dreams" in 2005, there was "Shadows of a Dream" in 2004. These images were part of that gigantic 60-ft-long charcoal piece, which formed the centerpiece of Peter's landmark LIFE ON EARTH show at Pirate: A Contemporary Art Oasis in Denver.

Peter explained it in his Artist's Statement....

"These drawings are analogies for human emotions and experiences. And thinking of several things at once.

Once upon a time, the task of the artist was to portray and interpret the "real world." Now it is to discern if there is a reality behind the appearance of things. Reality is created by observation. This search through the "stuff" of the world, matter and flesh, is inherently erotic. And so is the act of drawing.

Why does the material world pull at us? Why do we desire the physical? It is our essence; we seek the spiritual through it. The visible world is the key, the path, to the higher, more spiritual life we desire. But it is "desire" that clouds the seeking. I don't renounce matter but immerse myself to find the spiritual behind it.

I have been thinking about the 'inter-connectedness' of things, the Uncertainty Principle, the fact that there may be no 'deep reality' underneath the appearances of objects, that traces of distant stars are passing through us at this moment, that the charcoal (carbon) with which I am drawing was once a living thing.

Where does one object end and another begin? Where does one idea end and another begin to form? Can theory become visual? For some viewers these combinations of images will be irritating; for others they will come together in surprising ways. Meanings intersect and overlap.

It is a beautiful, dangerous, heroic, courageous, delicate, maddening, and heartbreaking thing, this Life on Earth."

SOLD

partial installation view of SHADOWS OF A DREAM, 2004