Gary Cody masters both the virtual world of 3D objects and the physicality of paint in Pushing Tin, a series of brightly-coloured oil paintings of small objects and vintage tin toys. Not only is his illusionistic painting technique impeccable, Cody derives the content of these paintings from his own computer-generated 3D modeling.

Cody seeks to challenge our expectations of traditional still life arrangements with novel subject matter, dense arrangements and innovative viewpoints. His main interest is still primarily glass, with a hyperrealist focus on every transparency, refraction and distortion. He supplements other common still life subjects like fruit and vases with non-traditional items: pieces of rusted metal, antique toys, clocks and plastic flowers – images that seem perfectly familiar but which never existed in real life, because Cody conceived them on his computer.

In Pushing Tin, Cody explores original variations on point-of-view. These compositions have more extreme "camera angles" than earlier pieces. The objects appear to hang and hover, balance and shift in disconcerting picture planes. Through them, Cody challenges our mental models of objects as well as our beliefs about spatial relationships.

A former medical illustrator and computer animator, Gary Cody was born in Lethbridge, Alberta in 1950 and grew up in Calgary. He attended the Alberta College of Art from 1970-1974 and earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the University of Saskatchewan in 1976. In 1981 he received a Master of Visual Arts from the University of Alberta.

Pushing Tin is Gary Cody's second solo show at the Diane Farris Gallery.