Dimitar Genchev – The Good Machines

Dimitar Genchev – The Good Machines
Saturday, September 2nd to Saturday, October 7th

Gerhard Hofland is proud to present the solo exhibition The Good Machines with new paintings by Dimitar Genchev. This exhibition is Genchev’s third solo exhibition with the gallery, following SWEET PEA in 2015 and his debut Nostalgia from 2013.

The paintings of Dimitar Genchev are obscure and hyperreal at the same time. By altering real-life observations through a wide range of refined painting techniques, shifting of color, composition, and by applying various effects such as depth-of-field, the artist elevates seemingly despicable and ordinary scenes into poetic, timeless images. As a virtuously skilled figurative painter, Genchev transforms the flat surface of his paintings into almost tangible, three-dimensional environments that are as wondrous as they are a testimony to the artist’s abilities with his medium.

For The Good Machines, Genchev visited a series of abandoned heavy industry complexes in the cities of Sofia and Plovdiv, Bulgaria. By mixing selfmade photographs of these vacant industrial interiors with seemingly random elements and coloration, the artist depicts the ruins of communist Bulgaria, while simultaneously reflecting on the apparent beauty of these deserted scenes and the exposure of seemingly untouchable materials to the passage of time.

Dimitar Genchev (1985, BG) lives and works in Bulgaria and Amsterdam. He studied at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia, BG, the Utrecht School of the Arts (HKU) and was a resident at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. His works have been exhibited at Sofia City Art Gallery, Sofia, De Artillerie, Platform for young professional artists, Utrecht, and Arti et Amicitiae, Amsterdam, among many other spaces. In 2016, Genchev’s works were selected by curator Noor Mertens for the Prospects & Concepts section of Art Rotterdam.

Dimitar Genchev – The Good Machines
7 September – 7 October 2017
Opening Preview: Saturday, 2 September 17:00 – 19:00 hours

Alongside this exhibition a catalogue will be published looking back on the body of work of Dimitar Genchev. Both this exhibition and publication are made possible with the kind support of the Mondriaan Fund.