Hatemines II/I.Carrier

Despite showing academic promise and gaining good basic qualifications, Christopher left school at age 16 to become an apprentice model-maker at his father’s joinery and pattern-making company. He quits his unsatisfying job and from 1990 he is a dedicated player at drawing.

The work of Hipkiss is often very large in scale; his landscapes panoramic – often presenting infinite vistas; his spaces inhabited by multiple figures – whole populations even.

Hipkiss’ drawings are characterised by a minute attention to detail: we can see every hair on each head, each brick of a building.

Hipkiss sticks to black and white in his work. At times gold and silver inks are being used. Hipkiss’ reaction to questions about colour is emphatic: ‘Ah, the horror, the horror. I have a mental block about the use of colour. I love the precision of drawing and the very nature of colour makes precision harder to achieve.’

Hipkiss’ work deals with a personal, mythical realm, but based on things actually experienced. He does have ‘a little obsession with geopolitics.

I like the poetical power of political styled text and grand geographical theories, but [in the end] … they’re just tools to make a beautiful landscape.’

Hipkiss says ‘femininity taking over’ is an important theme.

He believes a past dominated by patriarchal development and destruction has resulted in the depletion of the earth’s resources, placing the best hope for the future in the hands of humanity’s feminine side and blurring the traditional power of the traditional gender roles.

The drawings depict a post-apocalypse landscape caused by the actions of mankind. There is no escape: the future is just as frenzied and stressful as our current lives, his inhabitants being just as victimized and mutated as the landscape.

See: www.chrishipkiss.org