An essay by Lita Barrie on the Floral paintings of Roland Reiss from the forthcoming monograph Roland Reiss: Painting & Sculpture
Barrie writes: "In the Floral Paintings, Reiss uses the flowers as a scaffold to create in-between spaces where surprising things can happen. The flowers float in the center of these paintings like a galaxy. Reiss juxtaposes multiple perspectives of space, as both flat and infinitely deep. Viewed from afar, the human-scale flowers, bursting with vibrant translucent color, are experienced in a body- scale relationship. Viewed from a close focus, tiny surprising details are discovered in the gaps between the flowers. The play on large and small scale, telescopic and microcosmic perspectives, resembles a zoom camera lens …
Reiss keeps the 'static' of different textures in the background to create spatial tension – unlike painting that relies heavily on computer technology and loses the tension needed to create depth. He holds the viewer in suspense, discovering surprising details that vibrate in the gaps between the galaxies of floating flowers."