Dorothee Joachim + Richard Roth

We’re pleased to feature Dorothee Joachim and Richard Roth in the off space. Both approach painting from a similar focused position that favors a dedication to articulated processes, but the results differ greatly. Joachim’s approach is laborious and surprisingly dense; the work subverts the struggle of that facture to become effortless, airy and luminous. By carefully applying hundreds of layers of very diluted pigment from a limited chromatic range, she creates physically roboust objects with an attitude of subtle translucency. To perceived and experience the material process of the work is to begin to understand something of the power of paint and process to activate and transcend a surface.

Richard Roth returned to painting in 2006 after a 10 year hiatus; previously, his practice was rooted primarily in collecting, archiving and presenting contemporary material culture. Rooting around in an expansive 3-D polychrome universe—product and package design, nature, architecture, masks, custom cars, and fashion—informs the recent work with a conceptual and post-modern attitude. His paintings are diminutive in stature—almost anti-heroic—use an efficient and direct vocabulary and offer an immediate retinal charge. The paintings’ unusual depth elevates them to the realm of formidable, tangible object, enabling him to explore the formal concerns of abstract painting in three dimensions while riffing on real and illusionistic space. This is Richard Roth’s first exhibition with the gallery.

Dorothee Joachim has exhibited her paintings widely since the late seventies. Recent solo projects include the installation IM ROHBAU in Cologne; exhibitions at devening projects + editions in Chicago, the Brühler Kunstverein in Brühl, Germany, pp projects in Hamburg, and Kunst in NRW in Aachen-Kornelimünster. She recently participated in Kunstmeile Wangen #4 in Wangen/Allgäu and was part of group shows the Gesellschaft für Kunst und Gestaltung (GKG) in Bonn; Judith Racht Gallery in Harbert, MI, Angle art contemporain in Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux (F), Halle Zehn in Cologne, Galerie oqbo in Berlin, Karl Ernst Osthaus-Museum in Hagen, and Hunter College / Times Square Gallery in New York. Her work is featured in numerous private and public collections including Kolumba and Museum Ludwig in Cologne. Dorothee Joachim lives and works in Cologne.

Richard Roth’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. His work has been exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art, NY; Tomlinson Kong Contemporary, NY; Galerie Rob de Vries, The Netherlands; David Richard Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM; HICA, Highland Institute of Contemporary Art, Loch Ruthven, Scotland; The Suburban, Oak Park, IL; Rocket Gallery, London; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and Reynolds Gallery, Richmond; UCR/California Museum of Photography; the Museum of Modern Art, Saitama, Japan; and Feigen, Inc., Chicago. He is currently a faculty member in the Painting and Printmaking Department at Virginia Commonwealth University.