"Whether portraying a graffiti tag below a retail window or the bond patterns of bricks, the artist known as Pizza in the Rain, or PITR, illuminates city streets and commercial ephemera in striking detail. With meticulous attention to geometry and quotidian features, the Chicago-based artist highlights business signage and urban facades in an almost narrative way, with the occasional figure passing through on foot or on a bike."
"Simultaneously immersive and nostalgic, we're invited in and at the same time reminded of disappearing vestiges of past eras. From storefront to storefront, we can imagine PITR's compositions are snapshots of one continuous city, even though many of the distinctive locations are in different places around the U.S. Many recent scenes are evocative of New Orleans, with boarded-up shutters, like those often seen in the French Quarter, or historical markers."
PITR renders urban facades and commercial signage with precise geometry and attention to everyday details, treating sidewalk marks, awnings, and neon as subjects of equal importance. Compositions present storefronts and blocks as immersive, nostalgic cityscapes where realism meets a subtle surrealism and slightly dystopian imperfections. Many scenes evoke New Orleans motifs—boarded shutters and historical markers—while other works reference real locations like Circo's Pastry Shop in Brooklyn and The California Clipper in Chicago. The work resembles continuous snapshots of a single city despite depicting different U.S. locations. Parallel Structures, featuring PITR and Max Seckel, opens September 12 at Mortal Machine Gallery in New Orleans.
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