LOS ANGELES, CA.- Kohn Gallery announced the representation of New York-based artist Nir Hod. Over the last 20 years the artist has exhibited internationally in Europe, Asia, Israel and the United States, and has established a reputation for intrinsically beautiful works, from figuration to abstraction, that belie a deeper, fundamental meaning. Last July, Kohn Gallery debuted Hod’s first West Coast solo exhibition of paintings and sculpture titled The Life We Left Behind.

Known for his reflective, abstract paintings, Hod often begins his process with heavily-labored gradient beneath paintings adding a chroming technique first developed by the U.S. Navy in 1939, then degrading this finish application via water, ammonia, air pressure and various acids to create a surface tension between newfangled industrial applications and age-old oil technique. His canvases are heavily laden with paint and chrome, and the result is a perfect, nuanced balance between surface elegance and painterly depth.

"Nir is that rare artist who has a facility with both representation and abstraction. He’s able to mix both together, which might seem improbable, and does so with conceptual depth and artistic ease. Nir breaks artistic norms with astonishing results”, says Michael Kohn. “We are so honored to represent the work of Nir Hod and the artistic breadth that it embodies.”

Nir Hod is currently showing at the Jewish Museum in New York and Sara Hilden Art Museum in Finland. Nir Hod’s work is included in the permanent collections of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, The Israel Museum, The Jewish Museum and numerous private collections around the world.

Nir Hod (b. 1970, Tel Aviv, Israel) lives and works in New York. He earned his BFA at Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem and attended Cooper Union School of Art in New York City in 1991. Hod has had several solo exhibitions in the United States and abroad with his first show in 1996 at Noga Gallery of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv. He has had solo exhibitions at Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, Israel; The Museum of Israeli Art, Ramat Gan, Israel; Jack Shainman Gallery in New York, NY; Paul Kasmin Gallery in New York, NY; Gavlak Gallery in Palm Beach, FL; and Michael Fuchs Gallery, Berlin, Germany, among others. His work has been in numerous group exhibitions nationally and internationally from New York to London, Berlin, Vienna, and Israel. These include the Tel Aviv Museum, Tel Aviv, Israel; Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; The Jewish Historical Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Martin-Gropius-Bau Museum, Berlin, Germany; Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, NY; The Jewish Museum, New York, NY; The Vienna Jewish Museum, Vienna, Austria; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel; Yerba Buena Center for the Art, San Francisco, CA; Museum of Modern Art, Oostende, Belgium; The Flag Art Foundation, New York, NY; Marlborough Gallery, New York, NY; among others.