Charlie Oscar Patterson simultaneously produces multiple bodies of work that embrace the history of modernist painting, they are a continuation and combination of minimalism and abstraction that merge sculpture with painting.
The earlier shaped relief work use acrylics to achieve a sense of flat perfection in the surface, these paintings are about the sculptural form of shape and colour, so to have brush marks or imperfections would distract from their almost computer generated surface.
The more recent body of modular work uses oil paints for the opposite reason, Patterson feels these works need a richer and more dense colour, by building up multiple layers of oil, in some cases up to 15 coats, they create a deeper and more rough surface. What he finds interesting is the viewers relationship to these works is completely different depending on how you are seeing them, he is completely aware that most people are viewing them on their smart phones so they would be perceived to be minimalist colour field paintings but in person they are to be experienced as sculptural forms with subtle nuances of abstraction. Patterson wants these paintings to have the same kind of expressive power as music or literature, he sees them as paintings that act an instruments playing with light.