Sea Monsters & Highballs is Tom Schneider’s first solo exhibition in 25 years and the first in the UK. This exhibition sets out to investigate the history and practice of a painter once forgotten- one of the great artistic voices of Chicago, who honed his technique back in the 1990’s.
Schneider studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, under Karl Wirsum, a Hairy Who star. The Hairy Who transformed the art landscape in the 1960’s, amidst national upheaval – during the Vietnam war, assassinations of politicians, and chaotic racial and gender relations. Radically manipulating imagery from popular culture found in advertisement posters, comic books and catalogues, they were provocative, progressive and humorous. Schneider was influenced by, yet rebelling against, the Chicago Imagist tradition in equal measure. Inspired by German conceptual artists like Hannah Höch, he was exploring a creative process which would become distinctively his own.
Twenty-five years ago, his first solo show opened at the renowned Phyllis Kind Gallery and he was singled out as a rising star. After she closed the doors to her gallery and the Chicago art scene lost all momentum, he lost faith in the artworld altogether to the point of giving up painting in 2012. A single painting sat on his easel from 2012-2018. Following a landmark solo exhibition at the Grinnell College Museum of Art in 2018 the next year Schneider put a new stretcher on his easel and put paint to linen and has not looked back since.
With a technique honed in 1991, the work is intensely detailed, innovatively established through a matrix of eyes and mouths that obscure the paintings’ ground. Originally in India ink, Schneider drew yearbook portraits, repeating features until they abstracted, creating a unique surface to paint on. We are fortunate to have one of only four India Ink Face paintings in existence, Face Four (1990), a work that forms the most important of preliminary pillars to Schneider’s practice. It depicts a grid of faces present in all of Schneider’s paintings from this point on, a structure that the viewer has to peer through in order to see the representational matter of the painting. Moving forward and into colour, through the 1990’s and into the 2000’s, mouths and eyes take on brighter pigments and narratives weave their way on top of these busy grounds. Almost cinematically composed, Schneider depicts scenes amalgamated from myth, fable and popular culture. His universe is truly one of a kind.
Schneider is painting again now and remains refreshingly inventive, there are examples of very recent works in this exhibition alongside historically important pieces. His riotous compositions offer an alternate reality deserved of new audiences. In a world which is again in the midst of multiple tumultuous events, Schneider moves back and forth through history, allegory, science fiction and film, cutting and editing an amalgamation of scenes worthy of the wildest of imaginations. There is a giant squid engulfing a yellow rubber dingy, sea monsters, a mermaid holding a machine gun, Martian women and Minotaur’s at pool parties. The Schneider fantasy goes on, it does not date or age, his fictional narratives are as compelling, pleasurable, and escapist as they ever were. And we are still in need of them.
Sea Monsters & Highballs is an exploration of a body of work across many decades, delving into a world that only Schneider could create. Beyond the complex painterly structures and clever distancing techniques is a painter who creates pure magic. We are delighted to be unearthing his work for this truly exciting exhibition and the gallery is incredibly grateful to Daniel Malarkey for introducing us to this exceptional artist.
