David Pher Take It Or Leave it For Sale
David Pher
Take It Or Leave it, 2023
Acryl on Canvas
59 x 59 In
About this work
David Pher has established himself as a distinctive voice in contemporary urban art, bridging the raw energy of street culture with the refined techniques of studio practice. The Berlin-based artist has garnered significant attention for his layered compositions that interrogate consumer culture, identity, and the visual noise of modern existence. His work sits at the intersection of pop art traditions and contemporary graffiti aesthetics, drawing comparisons to the New Leipzig School while maintaining a singular visual language rooted in his background as a muralist and graphic artist. "Take It Or Leave it" exemplifies Pher's mature approach to canvas work, presenting viewers with a bold declaration that functions both as invitation and challenge. Executed in acrylic at an imposing 59 x 59 inches, the square format creates a confrontational presence that demands engagement. The piece demonstrates his characteristic fusion of typography, gestural mark-making, and carefully orchestrated color fields. The title itself operates on multiple registers—a commentary on choice, agency, and the transactional nature of contemporary life, delivered with the directness that has become central to Pher's practice. Created in 2023, this work represents the artist's continued evolution as his presence in the primary market expands across Europe and North America. Collectors have increasingly recognized the investment potential in Pher's output as institutional interest grows and exhibition opportunities multiply. The scale and confident execution of this particular canvas position it as a significant example from this productive period. For acquisition inquiries regarding this work by David Pher, please contact Guy Hepner in New York.
Price on Application
Edition & Provenance
- Year
- 2023
- Medium
- Acryl on Canvas
More from this series
About the Paintings Series
The original paintings of David Pher move between psychological weight and raw chromatic force. Working large-scale from his Berlin studio, Pher builds surfaces through repeated layering, overpainting, and erasure, leaving the history of each canvas visible in its final state. The result is painting that feels accumulated rather than resolved.
Several works carry German titles that operate as interior landscapes. Am Teich, Leises Land, and Yellancolia hold a quieter register, weighted with stillness and psychological depth. The invented language of Yellancolia, merging yellow and melancholia, is characteristic of Pher's approach: meaning suggested rather than stated.
Others push outward. Noise Over Meaning, Say Yes - Mean No, and In Vino Traumatas address the contradictions of contemporary life with a directness that reads as both personal and cultural. Take It Or Leave It and The Reincarnation of Hugo Drax carry a more confrontational, even theatrical charge.
Sonetta stands apart as the most lyrical work in the group, its title evoking a musical form that mirrors the rhythm and color balance of the composition itself.
Pher uses acrylic, oil, chalk, and drawn interventions across surfaces that hold physical presence in a room. The scale is intentional. These are not works to be glanced at but moved into, their internal dynamics revealing themselves gradually.
Each painting is unique, hand-finished, and signed by the artist.
About David Pher
David Pher is a Berlin-based contemporary artist working primarily in large-scale painting. Born in central Germany in the 1980s, he developed an early focus on color, rhythm, and spatial tension, concerns that continue to structure his practice. His work sits at the intersection of gestural abstraction, chromatic field painting, and materially driven surface work, with color functioning as the primary compositional agent across the pictorial field.
Pher's approach resists a single visual language. Certain works move toward expansive, color-dominant compositions that border on abstracted landscape, while others draw in fragmented text, graphic notation, and moments of deliberate semantic disruption. Meaning in these paintings is neither fixed nor resolved, remaining open to the viewer's reading.
Central to his methodology is the accumulation of process. Surfaces are built through successive layering, overpainting, interruption, and partial erasure, keeping the temporal construction of each work visible. This is what gives the paintings their characteristic physical density.
Pher's work has been exhibited across Europe and the United States, including his debut at Art Miami in 2024. His paintings are held in private and public collections in Europe, the Middle East, and the United States. In 2023 he collaborated with Zara, and in 2025 with Berlin-based label August Eleven, extending his practice beyond the gallery context.