In Paul Pitsker’s new watercolor show at George Billis Gallery in Los Angeles, the painter is thrilled in the concept that paintings are empathy detectors that are turned toward viewers.
“Paintings really are little personality tests that can measure how much empathy a person may have. In some ways that’s why I like how watercolors are shown under glass—the glass keeps the audience from intervening in the painting. All they can do is watch,” the painter says from his studio in Santa Monica, California. He illustrates this point with a new work, Glowing, which shows a deep sea angler fish swimming in the glass dome of a candy vending machine. Outside the machine are fluttering butterflies. “It’s a collision of two different worlds that would never interface under normal circumstances. The piece asks viewers what they would do: Would you put a coin in and see what popped out, or would you put a piece of tape over the coin slot to protect the fish?”
Key Bird, watercolor, 16 x 12"
Obsess, watercolor, 16 x 12"These questions, and many others, are meant to intrigue and perplex viewers, which they are sure to do in Pitsker’s new show, It’s All Arranged, opening May 16 at George Billis Gallery.
Pitsker will be showing 18 new works, all of them in watercolor, a medium that has different reputations depending on who you’re talking to. “It’s known as a delicate medium, or one that is not taken too seriously, or even a feminine medium—something that ladies would do in their free time for centuries—so it comes with a lot of things attached to it,” he says. “But I like it all. I like that it comes with so much attached to it…These watercolors are still lifes, but they’re more about the stillness of still life, and I try to heighten the suspense and narrative tension.”
Some of the new works include a marbled background, which is achieved by dipping a masked-off painting into paint that is suspended on the top of a pool of water. The process, sometimes called hydro-dipping, produces a mesmerizing marble pattern. After the dip, Pitsker removes the masking and paints in the unaffected areas. Works that show this technique include Crackers and Admiral, both featuring birds. 
Glowing, watercolor, 25 x 18"
Crackers, watercolor, 10 x 7"
“Paul Pitsker’s watercolors capture surreal, darkly humorous moments of beauty. The paintings reference how fragile life is and how fleeting—a nod to a memento mori painting—but with a wink. Painted larger than life, the small songbirds and transparent jellyfish inhabit worlds where they are in peril. At first glance the paintings appear whimsical but upon closer inspection, the complexities of Pitsker’s subjects become apparent: jellyfish in a gumball machine, flowers in a vase of hot sauce, a bird feeding a key to its baby,” says Tressa Williams, director of the gallery. “Pitsker’s handling of the medium is also extraordinary. His paintings are jewel toned with rich blacks—there is none of the flow textures so common with watercolor. His technique of building up dense layers of pigment allows him the ability to create luxuriously velvety color fields and his mastery of the medium gives him an unprecedented level of control in the details: glass glints, bird feathers and butterfly wings seem ready to take flight, and flowers seems to bloom before our very eyes.” —
George Billis Gallery • 2716 S. La Cienega Boulevard • Los Angeles, CA 90034 • (310) 838-3685 • www.georgebillis.com
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