Jack Bishop / Cows

Description

Rendered in his earlier pixelated, blocky technique, this painting by Jack Bishop captures a surreal and nostalgic landscape that reinterprets the digital origins of a now-familiar image. Inspired by an early Microsoft screen background, the work balances whimsy with cultural commentary—blurring the boundaries between natural scenery, digital memory, and narrative invention.

Cows stand semi-abstracted atop a grassy hill, stylized into jagged, polygonal forms reminiscent of early 3D graphics. A bold bicycle road sign is inexplicably tethered to one of them by a chain, suggesting both absurdity and subtle metaphor. To the right, a lone cyclist hunches into motion—rendered in a similar aesthetic language, as if gliding through a simulated world. The entire scene is bathed in a sky of bright digital blues and oranges, constructed from patchwork strokes that mimic pixelation or compression artifacts.

This work marks a distinctive moment in Bishop’s artistic evolution—before his transition into moody interiors and psychological realism. Yet even here, his enduring themes are present: the tension between reality and simulation, the odd familiarity of landscapes half-remembered, and the gentle surrealism of the everyday. There’s a tonal kinship with David Hockney’s digital iPad studies, filtered through the humor and formal clarity of Alex Colville’s East Coast narrative minimalism, with a nod to early video game aesthetics.

The result is quietly funny, gently unsettling, and visually magnetic—a contemporary pastoral that feels equal parts computer memory and roadside daydream.

Condition: Excellent, framed.

Vertical
30
Horizontal
40

Depth
2