It is the first exhibition of his recent works in Munich. The artist, born 1981, lives and works in Berlin and has shown internationally, including Hong Kong, Mumbai and Berlin. The exhibition includes a selection of works from recent series: Anthropocene, Remembrance of Realms Past, Strata Obscura and Tabula Rasa.
Gestural strokes of calligraphic ink fused with the inertia of paint upon white canvases share both complimentary and frictional qualities in Anthropocene. Varying in weight and thickness, the energetic marks expel across the surface in various directions. Spontaneous expressions and visual articulations generate deliberate patterns, forms and expanses of monochromatic colour within an orderless composition. The expressive mark-making and frenzied strokes form a loose and gestural aesthetic, yet rooted in calculated exactitude in advancing the visual narrative.
Remembrance of Realms Past explores the boundaries which envelop the relationship between the artist's hand and the attempt to instantiate the natural world, where depictions of nature are not presented as mere representations of the external world but rather the ideology of nature. These works become a window to an imagined space rather than as a sculptural / pictorial element. From this space, the landscape of each painting - coaxing from this organic foundation the development of a myriad of ornamental forms - coalesce into compositions that appear as an object for the viewer's mind, rather than as an open window for the viewer's eye.
In Strata Obscura, the immersive and illusory narrative of the works allude to an earlier series L'apparition, where perceptions of dimensionally fluid and malleable visual contexts are examined. The works' primary concerns include the effects of colour as light, shadow as dimensionally formal structures, and thus engages the viewer to a certain dualistic aesthetic. Beneath the dichroic surface the unexposed topographical element (composed of industrial aluminium) succumbs to colour changes and visual variations. The elemental structure - reminiscent of stratum - becomes obscured as it adheres to the interplay of form, light, and setting. Relying on the reflective capacities, the solid structure underlying each work seem to dematerialise (depending on the viewer's perception / viewpoint).
Two works from the series, Tabula Rasa, bring opposing principles that are subject to both cogitation and negation. Using Chinese calligraphy Xuan paper beneath linear Plexiglas; both materials become subliminal references to the mind (that at birth the mind is a "blank slate" without rules for processing data, and that data is added and rules for processing are formed solely by one's sensory experiences). The paper, like the mind, awaits the calligrapher’s hand to engrave cognisance onto its blank surface. The Plexiglas becomes the ‘lens’ that focuses the process of gradual or unconscious assimilation of ideas – yet to be imprinted. Sheets of aluminium foil and dichroic film dominate equally in this series. Whilst the calligraphy paper becomes the metaphor for a mind that absorbs, the reflective nature of the foil and the colour variations of the dichroic film symbolise an alternative conduit for cognition.
Press release courtesy of IAM.
