recap: TECHNICOLOR HELLSCAPE

by Emma Riva

Photography by Benjamin Brady

Ketchup City Creative owner Nanci Goldberg told artist Travis Trium Perfectum she wanted “weird.” She was excited for weird, and Perfectum delivered in his three-day exhibition Technicolor Hellscape, a multimedia exploration of the darker side of the afterlife.

It was, as Trium Perfectum put it, “a match made in hell,” since Ketchup City Creative is where the weird kids hang out. From Neon Gothic in February to Aletheia’s Anime & Illustration group show in March, Technicolor Hellscape, and finally the upcoming Chaotic Structures trio show between Grant Catton, Brent Pheto, and Corey Ochai, the gallery space in Sharpsburg has become a sort of haven for out of the box ideas by unconventional people.

Though it can be challenging to sell due to a lack of connection with mainstream collectors at a smaller gallery, the last two shows I’ve seen at Ketchup City Creative, William Pfahl’s archival retrospective and now Perfectum’s, have both resulted in large sales. One of my biggest takeaways from speaking with Perfectum and viewing his work was just what a thorough businessperson he was, and it’s worth noting his approach, as one of the biggest conversations in the Pittsburgh art scene right now is “How in the world can any of us make a living off this?”

Perfectum’s approach of self-promotion and mixed media merchandise seemed to work. He used a wide distribution of physical fliers to promote the show and fill the gallery, and while I was in the exhibition space one gallerygoer mentioned she had come from a flier in the cafe Biddle’s Escape. Perfectum sold a decent amount of his catalogue, including the large work Observation Hour Over Desolation and a wide range of prints, limited editions, and merchandise. Plus, every time a piece sold, it didn’t just get a red dot on the wall but instead an artistically rendered tab sticker designed by Perfectum himself letting people know This Piece Has Been Sold. His multimedia background in industrial music, graphic design, and poetry means he is a master at being intentional about space and presentation. For Perfectum, every detail matters. He’s even intentional about the frames each painting goes into. Some have intricate gold antique frames while others are small and minimalist, but none are the type you’d simply find at the craft store.

The technicolor element of Technicolor Hellscape was new territory for Perfectum, who ordinarily only works in in charcoal. “I wanted to do something both dark and vibrant,” he said. Mixing charcoal and pastel together, however, had its challenges. The two mediums resisted each other or ran together. “The more I read about it, the more I thought maybe I had made a mistake,” he remembered.  But Perfectum persisted, resulting in eerie, aurora borealis-like greens and sunset-hue reds in the backgrounds of each piece. He calls the characters that appear in the paintings of Technicolor Hellscape “entities” that represent guides to different emotions within the show’s narrative. There’s a little bit of irony in the fact that Perfectum paints these dark, unsettling entities with harsh, unfeeling eyes while he himself is easygoing, personable, and earnest.

Though he is so personable, Perfectum’s Instagram handle and brand is I am unlike you. “I always felt very different than what other people were doing,” Perfectum said. “I don’t drink coffee or eat sushi or drink alcohol or do drugs. I’ve always felt like somewhat of an alien—people make assumptions about me and they’re almost always wrong. So, I just decided to make that my brand.” He takes his artist’s last name, Trium Perfectum, from a Latin phrase meaning things in threes are perfect. “The rule of thirds is pretty much the only rule I hold sacred,” he said, and his paintings show that sense of composition in them.

I went to look at Technicolor Hellscape and view the video installation component of the exhibit on Rosh Hashanah. In Judaism, there is no hell, but going from synagogue to Technicolor Hellscape made for a pretty unique viewing experience. That contrast made me think more deeply about the questions Perfectum was engaging with. Do we waste our lives waiting for something better to come along in the next one? How can we ever stay in the moment and have empathy for others when all we can really know and control is ourselves? Sartre declared l’enfer, c’est les autres—hell is other people. But “I Saw A Hellscape,” Perfectum’s video installation, postures that hell might actually be us. Perfectum digitally modified his voice to a metal-singer rasp, and as you approach the grainy, VHS-like screen the entity appears on, it demands a sacrifice, then eventually says “I looked inside of you…and I saw a hellscape.”

Looking at it made me feel a little bit like the moment in Lord of the Flies when shy, introspective epileptic Simon looks up at the decaying pig’s head in the jungle. The boys stranded on a deserted island live in fear of something they call the Beast, but Simon hallucinates the corpse of a pig the others skewered saying to him: “Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! […] You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you? Close, close, close! I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are the way they are?”

Through all the macabre theatrics, Perfectum gets at a universal anxiety: That there really is only you. No one is going to make choices for you. All of the theatre of heaven, hell, good, and bad fall away at the end of the night when you’re faced with being alone with your own thoughts. This is one of my personal least favorite universal truths, which is perhaps why I spend so much time writing fiction and looking at other people’s artwork. But Perfectum uses a dramatic narrative to expose how farcical all of these ideas are.

Perfectum thought big with Technicolor Hellscape and made use of Ketchup City Creative’s niche for the oddballs. He sees Pittsburgh as the perfect place for creators who want to think weird. “I’ve been all over the place, and there’s nowhere like Pittsburgh,” he said. Pittsburgh is glad to have him.

Travis Trium Perfectum will be vending at the Allentown Night Market on October 14.