America is as much an idea as it is a geographical place. For us, Entertainment. It is a country we know through images, narratives and cultural expressions, a country we have learned to love, make fun of and fear. Its self image constantly tosses us between the grand and the absurd, and somewhere along the way, its visual world has also become our own. We got it.

At Richter Holtermann, three painters meet who each, in distinct ways, relate to this visual reality. Tova Tilliander, William Reed and Kevin Judge work with painting as a way to renegotiate images we already recognize, or at least think we recognize.

In Tova Tilliander’s oil painting, cinematic moments, 1970s Playboy and fragments of a collective visual memory resurface. With a seemingly spontaneous naturalness, her brush moves in sweeping strokes, and suddenly the work becomes a reality of its own.

William Reed’s acrylic painting instead moves freely between fantasy and pop cultural associations. His playful visual world seems to follow its own logic, where the absurd is cranked up to an ultra comical level.

Kevin Judge’s near meticulous precision, in turn, creates a tension between the controlled and the inexplicable. The images appear familiar, yet refuse to fully reveal themselves.

Together, they form a kind of American panorama, where nostalgia, desire, humor and unease coexist side by side. Here you find high school, fake news, erotism, gambling and neon. Not as a depiction of America, but as a reminder of how deeply its fictions have penetrated into people's blissful dreams and escapism.

Welcome!