Rob Birza

Though not weaned from an occasional hint of sentiment , his work is characterized by irony and relativism. Birza takes pleasure in toying subversively with painterly values and norms, while paying little heed to the rules established by modernist art and, from Holbein to Warhol, he gave the history of art a thorough shuffling. In The Red  Play, a painting in the shape of a pinball machine, he plays a game with Lucio Fontana and his perforated canvases. This painting is more than a pastiche. In a way Birza ridicules the rules of play set up by his predecessors, but at the same time he recognizes the current relevance of their work.