In his solo exhibition gta paintings by István Ódor Bence Ódor (1992), the intoxication of virtual adventures unfolding in the Grand Theft Auto universe dissolves into the solid madness of acrylic spots shining with unassuming serenity. The textures that stimulate the touch and the shimmers that attest to hyperreality fade away through the peculiar forgetting mechanism of the screenshots that are the starting point, which are broken down into colour fields by digital halftones.
Instead of the rock-star over-revving of the graphics engine, we are plunged into ethereally sparkling “side missions” where racing cars pondering the melancholy of a far-off endpoint and off-duty gangsters search together for a recipe for a meaningful life.
The ten paintings on display at gta paintings sum up the latest stage in a cycle of paintings that has been taking shape since 2019, in which Ódor combines his dedication to the game with a taut post-digital quasi-figurative quality. In his first series, Ódor was already concerned with the scribble’s doodle that erodes the information-richness of the photographic image; in his latest series, he extends this logic to the entire surface.