Across the spectrum of his mixed media works, Alistair Frost uses examples of computer-generated imagery that imitate the ‘hand-drawn’ and are chosen from clip art archives and manipulated in various ways to create a visual babble of both canvas and installation works. These digital stock images are dragged and dropped into a painterly pool: a cartoon gentleman’s blazer is reworked by the artist; the silhouette of a clip art Martini glass is painted across a plinth crowned by irregular, hand-crafted sculptures of the featured image; a rough, painted dash of blue resides ambiguously in the same space as a thin, black geometric grid. The disruptive dialogue between the digital and handmade coupled with a gentle satirical prodding sees Frost raise questions about authenticity and matters of representation. His palette typically ensconces faded hues that evoke leisurely pursuits and both his computer drawings and interventions resist hard edges and prescriptive trajectories, often unfinished, with a supreme lightness of touch. While referencing Lichtenstein’s graphic-based aesthetics and Buren’s stripe paintings, Frost advances the conversation by employing a politic of subversion: pixilated digital hallmarks are placed alongside roughly-hewn handmade scribbles, presenting a world in which there is no longer a survival of the fittest dynamic, but both past and present trends enter in an awkward and revealing coexistence.

Alistair Frost (b.1981) lives and works in London. He graduated with an MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art, London and a BA in Painting from the Glasgow School of Art. Recent exhibitions include the Writing Is on the Wall, Jonathan Viner off-site project space, Margate; AFK <> AZQ <> ART, Boltelang, Zurich (both 2013); Image coming soon, Mary Mary, Glasgow ; Out of Office Auto Reply, Christian Andersen, Copenhagen (both 2012) DOVBLE TROVBLE, Centre for Contemporary Art, Glasgow (2012) and Airplane Mode, Zach Feuer Gallery, New York (2011). He has works in the collections of Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Portland Museum of Art. Frost is represented by Mary Mary, Glasgow and Zach Feuer Gallery, New York.