Paul Rousso — Abstract Solids For Sale

The Abstract Solids are one of several bodies of work Paul Rousso has developed around his Flat Depth concept, the practice of collapsing three-dimensional form into two dimensions using plexiglass, heat, painting, printing and digital manipulation.

What sets this series apart from his better known currency and newspaper works is the absence of any recognizable subject. There are no dollar bills, no candy wrappers, no cultural artifacts. The works are pure form: large metallic surfaces, crumpled and folded, rendered in single saturated colors. Gold, silver, cobalt, crimson, rose, pearl. The titles follow suit — Vibranium, Golden Kimono, Hot Embers, Eye of the Storm, Wicked Red.

The technical process is the same across Rousso's practice, but without a subject to anchor the eye the focus shifts entirely to surface, light and color. The plexiglass catches light differently depending on the angle, which gives the works a quality that changes as you move around them.

The pieces range in size, with some reaching several feet across, and are designed to hang on the wall like paintings while reading as sculptural objects. That tension between the flat and the dimensional is central to everything Rousso makes, and in this series it is the only thing going on. There is no commentary, no nostalgia. Just the material doing what he has spent decades learning to make it do.