“Alchemy neither composes nor mixes: it increases and activates that which already exists in a latent state.” Franz Hartmann

Actively involved in the Brooklyn based Still House Group, Nick Darmstaedter’s work pays homage to the Duchampian readymade as well as titans of American minimalism and Pop. The Grid Contains the Liquid is part of the artist’s Penny series, in which the artist has dipped hundreds of copper coins into salt and vinegar, allowing them to oxidize on the canvas surface, transforming them into his own brand of post-minimal abstraction. Darmstaedter appropriates the lowest form of U.S. currency, the penny, yet his treatment reveals a mature and exquisite touch.