RACHEL KNEEBONE

Posted on 2021-02-08

Rachel Kneebone’s intricate works address and question the human condition: renewal, transformation, life cycles and the experience of inhabiting the body. Kneebone’s sculptures operate in a near-subliminal space, oscillating and blurring the boundaries between the conscious and the subconscious, the real and the imagined, everything and nothing. Working in porcelain, the material properties of her work further heighten and convey an awareness of opposing states, appearing to be not only heavy, solid and strong but also light, fragmentary and soft. This fluid movement between states is reflective of the wide range of art historical and literary sources that inform the artist’s practice. As Ali Smith has written, in Kneebone’s work ‘Michelangelo meets Angela Carter, the renaissance meets the contemporary, while the future simultaneously meets, melts, alters and fuses with the renaissance.’

Opposite – Dance, 2017

Exhibition runs through to March 14th, 2021

White Cube (Online Exhibition)
144-152 Bermondsey Street
SE1 3TQ
London

www.whitecube.com

  

LEENA NIO – IMPROVED PAINTINGS

Posted on 2021-02-08

Leena Nio’s new paintings are all about layers ­– both physically and symbolically. Layering has always been Nio’s signature technique, but this time the concept is taken to the next level. Nio experiments with a new technical idiosyncrasy in each of her exhibitions, with each painting taking its cue from a minor, commonplace occurrence. The mundanity leaves plenty of room for both the painting process and the viewer’s interpretations to unfold freely.

Like many peers of her generation, Nio collected stickers and Victorian die-cuts in her childhood. These “stickers” have now found their way into her paintings. The glossy, lacquered pictorial elements hovering on the surface of the canvas are – despite being hand-painted – deceptively reminiscent of stickers or die-cuts. They are like emojis added to a text message. Or Instagram posts with added stickers and filters. The paintings in the exhibition achieve the same effect: using 21st-century tools, they take the message to the next level. With her add-on flourishes, Nio also self-reflexively comments on her process. Often finding it difficult to know when to finish a painting, she adds the final sticker as if dotting an “i” or crossing a “t.”

Opposite – Cherry, 2021

Exhibition runs through to February 28th, 2021

Galerie Forsblom
Galerie Forsblom Yrjönkatu 22
00120 Helsinki
Finland

www.galerieforsblom.com

  

CHRIS JOHANSON

Posted on 2021-02-08

Comprising of scenes and abstracted forms, Johanson’s works addresses thoughts of an existential nature, and reflect the experience of our current times. Incorporating leading and probing texts within the charged imagery, Johanson encourages the viewer to query what is presented, and to consider the parallels in our lives.
His treatment of such scenes and the starkness in which the details are presented suggest fragments of recollection, or documentation of activities of the past year.
Phrases like ‘Who Knows’, ‘Occupy Time’ and the placement of words seen in And, While all allude to the uncertainty and sense of waiting pervading the global community. In Remember, two figures on scooters in the centre of a hazy blue setting conjure a nostalgia for a carefree normality that now seems alien in contrast to the masked figures in spaced seating depicted in (LA Metro Silver Linings Public Art Project drawing #6) that is now ubiquitous. First And Foremost, This Is A Person features a solitary figure clad in black, kneeling with both arms in the air, indisputably brings to mind recent headlines. In most of the paper works, there is an urgency in its execution, capturing only the key details of the overall scene to convey particular moments and emotions.

Opposite – What I Can Say, 2020-21

Exhibition runs through to March 1st, 2021

The Modern Institute
3 Aird’s Lane
G1 5HU Glasgow
Scotland

www.themoderninstitute.com

  

PHILIP GUSTON – TRANSFORMATION

Posted on 2021-02-01

Recognized as a pioneer of abstract expressionism before his return to figuration in the late 1960s, for Guston painting was an encounter between thought and feeling, image and idea. Within this exhibition, Hauser & Wirth will present two bodies of work from different periods, abstract (1952-64) and figurative (1968-1977), that together show the depth and complexity of his personal iconography. Available to view in person and online, the significant collection of 14 drawings and paintings reveals Guston’s complete commitment to direct experience, moving between a pictorial language relating to his studio and painting tools, to contemplative motifs of his wife, the poet Musa McKim, and their shared lives together. These deeply personal works transcend everyday experience to present an intimate vision of Guston’s creative process and unique artistic freedom.

Opposite – Musa, 1975

Exhibition runs through to March 28th, 2021

Hauser & Wirth
Via Serlas 22
7500 St. Moritz
Switzerland

www.hauserwirth.com

  

BRIAN MAGUIRE – WAR CHANGES ITS ADDRESS

Posted on 2021-02-01

Spanning depictions of Aleppo, South Sudan, and Juárez, Maguire engages with the currency of conflict images. Through large-scale paintings, whose surfaces are as luminous as they are sullen, the urgency within Maguire’s work often stems from the context and histories his sources portray. From bold depictions of landscapes in the aftermath of massacres, to seemingly innocent and banal interiors, the artist brings the weight that images of war and injustice impress upon our visual lexicon into attention.

Coming of age in Ireland during The Troubles, a period of tumultuous sectarian conflict that lasted nearly three decades from 1969–1998, Maguire’s work reminds us that the consequences of an ethno-nationalist agenda then are not so different from the unrest and civil disobedience faced in the United States today. As this text is being written, far-right rioters storm the Capitol, breaching the House and Senate; the President refuses to concede to a peaceful transition of power. Like the exhibition title suggests, ‘faraway’ trauma can find itself at the doorstep of our lived experience just as quickly.

Opposite – Grow House 2, 2015

Exhibition runs through to February 13th, 2021

Rhona Hoffman Gallery
1711 West Chicago Avenue
60622 Chicago
USA

www.rhoffmangallery.com

  

RIIKO SAKKINEN – TURBOREALIST ZOOLOGY

Posted on 2021-02-01

This year Riiko Sakkinen celebrates the 25th anniversary of the beginning of his artistic career. He held his first exhibition in February 1996 at the Jangva gallery. Sakkinen has kept a scrapbook copy of his first review, which was published in the paper Helsingin Sanomat. The review includes a quote from the artist, in which he comments on his show with his inimitable brand of irony: “My exhibition is plastic. It is a dead toilet gel flower.” The critic Tiina Nyrhinen picks up from here: “Superficiality is [here] a virtue and eclecticism is a condition of survival. The artist’s list of the ‘good’ things in life says a great deal about him and the times we are living in.”

Opposite – Snake, 2019

Exhibition runs through to February 28th, 2021

Galerie Forsblom
Galerie Forsblom Yrjönkatu 22
00120 Helsinki
Finland

www.galerieforsblom.com