Kristan Horton is a prolific artist – and his work is strikingly well constructed. Horton doesn’t seem to do anything in half measures.

Just look at this piece, Cig2Coke2Tin2Coff2Milk from 2006. The six minute stop motion animation shows how a package of Canadian cigarettes transforms – as if by magic – into a can of Coke.

Kristan Horton, Cig2Coke2Tin2Coff2Milk, 2006. Image: kristanhorton.com

Kristan Horton, Cig2Coke2Tin2Coff2Milk, 2006. Image: kristanhorton.com

This work begs the question: What is the difference between the can of coke and the simulated can of coke? You might say, the experience of “the real thing”.

Artists like (VoCA favorite) Gregor Schneider, Christoph Buchel and Mike Nelson have been re-creating reality as art for a while now, and with this work, Horton seems to be suggesting that the approach works on a smaller scale too.

This piece draws our attention to what a can of coke represents, its history, its trademark, the global quality of it and the fact that we rely on the authenticity of experience, but also the consistency of experience when it comes to manufactured products.

Kristan Horton, Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove, 2003-06. Image: kristanhorton.com

Horton is also well-known for his series Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove (2003 – 06), a photographic series in which he remade 200 stills from Stanley Kubrick’s film Dr. Strangelove: Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb with whatever came to hand in his Toronto studio. The series was shown at the Art Gallery of York University last year, and a catalogue of the work was produced, which you can buy HERE.

Kristan Horton, Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove, 2003-06. Image: kristanhorton.com

Here, an ambiguous history is filtered through a fictitious novel, through Hollywood, through time and over generations. It takes on a new, rather scary meaning in today’s political environment that may be seen, occasionally, as black comedy.

A brief plot synopsis of the film: “The story concerns a mentally unstable US Air Force general who orders a first strike nuclear attack on the Soviet Union, and follows the President of the United States, his advisors, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a Royal Air Force (RAF) officer as they try to recall the bombers to prevent a nuclear apocalypse…”

Kristan Horton, Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove, 2003-06. Image: kristanhorton.com

Most recently, his beautifully rendered graphite on paper Drawing of A History of the First World War (Discs 01, 02 and 03), 2008 stole the show at Signals in the Dark: Art in the Shadow of War, on at the University of Toronto’s Justina K. Barnicke Gallery and the Blackwood Gallery.

Kristan Horton, Drawing of A History of the First World War (Disc 01), 2008. Image: kristanhorton.com

Read VoCA’s review of the exhibition HERE.

The artist’s take on the experience of war was not only original, it is a pitch-perfect echo of the physical, historical, virtual distance through which Canadians of the artists’ generation perceive war.

Kristan Horton, Drawing of A History of the First World War (Disc 01), 2008 (Detail)
Image: kristanhorton.com

Many artists use pop cultural references in their work, but few manage to avoid the resulting one-liner artworks – we won’t mention any names.

Horton’s works give the viewer something more. His Dr. Strangelove images, for instance, are uncanny.

Kristan Horton, Broadcast, 2007. Image: kristanhorton.com

Kristan Horton is represented by Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, Toronto.

Click HERE for the gallery website.

Click HERE for the artist’s website, including upcoming exhibitions.