Sebastian Wahl

Using labor-intensive hand-collage techniques Wahl’s works on paper often harmonize concentric composition strategies with elements of landscape and narrative. Familiar imagery from pop culture, religious iconography, organic forms, and assorted psychedelia are remixed into mandala-esque designs from which topographies emerge with the addition of the human figure. Unexpected referential juxtapositions and playful shifts of content and scale create a viewing experience that is at once disorienting and contemplative.

Unlike many contemporary collage artists Wahl's astonishingly detailed works are executed without digital processes. A resin-coating technique he developed in 2006 lends a three-dimensional quality and an illuminating texture to each hand-constructed composition.

Wahl’s studio practice is often extended into the public realm, activating urban environments with large-scale murals. A former graffiti artist, Wahl will transform the Ideal Glass Gallery exterior, a 30’ x 15’ wheatpaste encrusted panel, with a new, site-specific collage mural, to be executed in the first two weeks of September. Sebastian Wahl has exhibited with MicroCosm Gallery, NYC, and his work is represented in private collections in New York, Los Angeles, Geneva and Stockholm.