Herbert Hamak’s artwork falls somewhere between painting and sculpture and springs from a combination of form, color, and light. Herbert Hamak works with pigment and mass; he shapes and molds them into simple forms that are mostly monochromatic, such as cubes, parallelogram, and columns.
His method for creating these forms results from his expertise in mixing pigments with resin and wax. This liquid substance is molded on a conventionally constructed canvas, which provides structure for it. Even though his method mandates the perfect mastering of the medium, the artist allows serendipity every opportunity to intervene: chance causes bubbles and distortions during the drying process and the exterior conditions alter the pigment colors. Thus, nothing is ever entirely controlled in Hamak’s work; repeating the same actions would produce different results.

Starting with the 300 or so pigments present in nature, Hamak plays with both the physical properties that allow color to appear to the eye and also with the diverse aesthetic mediums that enable color to attract our eyes. Since color results from a complex chemical process, Hamak’s works focus on color as both a physical material and as a property that reflects light. Because the color is imprissoned in a translucid material, it can interact with the surrounding light. Surfaces of paintings normally relect light, but Hamak’s paintings allows light to penetrate them. Light passes through the paintings, endowing them with a vaporous aspect that belies the true weight and mass of the object.