Cultural Baggage

"Opie transforms reality in form and colour. He builds real three dimensional objects, but as in a painting they have a specific viewpoint. Seen from the side the working material of bent steel is still visible. The painting is applied in such a spontaneous, almost casual fashion, that it is obvious that Opie is not interested in creating illusions, but new realities: not the 'trompe l'oeil' as a fake, but an artificial construction in order to create a visual language." (W. Herzogenrath, in 'Julian Opie', Cologne 1984, p.6.)