"Crowd Pleaser, New Mexico" Image courtesy of the artist and Luis de Jesus Gallery

In Chris Barnard’s Crowd Pleaser, New Mexico, a splintering shard of remaining daylight eclipses an empty box of metal bleachers facing a desolate desert landscape. Darkened clouds are set to converge, promising imminent darkness and threatening rain, but the spectacle has already taken place and the crowd has dispersed. The ambiguous New Mexican environ depicted in a pixelated and almost photo-realistic manner has been transformed from a natural habitat to the site of space shuttle launches and landings. Throngs of people can gather to witness military artifacts come out of top secret hiding places, to collectively affirm the existence of American military intelligence, and develop trust in an arsenal of aircraft, drones, and machinery paid for in tax dollars. The bleachers signify a moment of communal clarity, wherein the military becomes realized beyond its mere portrayal in news outlets. Barnard’s show, “Toward Trinity,” employs multiple painterly techniques meant to mimic the social conditioning imprinted onto Americans during wartime. Chris Barnard’s paintings express a genuine curiosity about the dissemination of information in contemporary culture. An alternating use of calculated brushwork and photorealistic renderings points to Barnard’s consideration that we accept information so long as we receive it through a filtered source. “Toward Trinity” plays with the power imbalance present between the American public and the American military and government. Even during wartime, we are kept in the dark when it comes to the effects of militarization on the ecology and on human existence.

"Father (Fat Man)" Image courtesy of the artist and Luis de Jesus Gallery

Mother depicts the interior of a massive airplane hangar, with a domed roof spewing out beams of colored light. Our vantage point above the nose of the massive aircraft allows a look inside the cockpit, where a hazy silhouette confronts us. Beneath the wingspan is a crude topographical map suggesting that the airplane, or Mother, has consumed mother earth and replaced its terrain with machinery. Using another familial title with Father (Fat Man), a spherical drone planted on the desert surface emerges from a network of calculated brushstrokes. “Toward Trinity” identifies a newly a realized trinity of the 21st century–the Father, Mother, and Star Child.

Thumbnail image: “Mother” courtesy of the artist and Luis de Jesus Gallery