Christian Hellmich

Christian Hellmich was born in 1977 in Düsseldorf, Germany and is among the latest wave of young German artists to make their mark on the New York art scene. Hellmich studied art with an emphasis on free diagramming/painting at the Folkwanschule of Essen. His first exhibition in New York, Arrangement was shown at the Lehmann Maupin Gallery. In 2010 he returned to New York for his second solo exhibition at Lehmann Maupin with paintings described as "architecture-derived complexities of zippy hard edges, delicately distressed surfaces, and day-dreamily sweet and acrid colors." Von der Heydth Kunsthalle Barmen featured a solo exhibition of his work. He lives and works in Berlin.

Hellmich’s work consists of large-scale, oil-on-canvas paintings that depict imagined architectural spaces with an emphasis on texture, geometry and form. Countering the vivid illusory dimension, Mr. Hellmich varies the paint quality to call attention to the material surfaces of his pictures. Paint is troweled, streaked, dripped, scumbled and otherwise given a suave, sensuously physical presence.

Christian Hellmich’s work is in prestigious collections worldwide and has been included in group exhibitions such as The Triumph of Painting at the Saatchi Gallery in London and Selections from the Permanent Collection at the Von der Heydt Museum in Wuppertal.