Warren Farr’s work is characterized by a sense of history, of irony, black humor, surreal dream images, isolation, melancholy and conflict with the influence of technology on human character. Farr’s gift is the ability to combine all of these elements into a coherent and precise, if somewhat magical, world of UFOs, Indian wizards, inventive and bizarre engineering feats, intriguing inventions, as yet unpatented machinery and, above all, Farr’s own “tilted” personality. The effect of these combinations usually elicits, at first, a smile and then, a “hmm...” as the viewer is captured by Farr’s ability to visually suspend disbelief— a necessary ingredient when the motif is science fiction and fantasy.

While Farr does not specifically mention the influence of science fiction writers in his work, there is an unmistakable involvement with alien worlds, with isolated and desolate landscapes; of worlds where technology has become a parody of itself; where the futility of invention is apparent; and barren landscapes testify to humanity’s preoccupation with technology at the expense of our environment, both physical and cultural.

While Farr generally tempers the more foreboding aspects of his vision with touches of wry humor, the viewer should never take his rather whimsical approach to the human condition too lightly, for he often tests our field of reference in surprising ways. For example, in Cones, the painting is peppered with cone shapes, from dunce caps to highway barriers, from ice cream cones to breasts, from satellite dishes to moose horns. But, in addition to the obvious visual references, he also introduces a touch of color, in contrast to his visual work in grisaille— an element which references the “cones” in our eye, those cones that make it possible for us to discern color.

In Find Your Sign and Superbowl XXXV, as in most of his work, there is a sense of people attempting in rather futile manners to define a character that, due to neglect (Farr’s ubiquitous irony exposed), has become more and more sterile and undefinable. (The lyrics to a popular song come to mind, something on the order of, “The less I try to define myself with definitives, the closer I am to fine.”) This characteristic— the alienation of humanity through excess definition, the sterilization of human character as it attempts to refine its definition of self in technological terms, the irony of a civilization bent upon improving its condition at the expense of those aesthetic appeals that, in fact, define its condition— is a recurring and central theme in Farr’s work, one which, no matter the representation, intrigues the viewer and prompts personal introspection and investigation. Farr’s work, while it may appear dreamlike or surreal on one level, also possesses a prophetic element which should prompt a pause in the most optimistic as well as the most cynical viewer.