PORTRAITS
PORTRAITS
27th March – 9th April 2018
Preview: Wednesday 28th March 18:00 – 20:30
The Brick Lane Gallery – The Annexe, 93-95 Sclater Street, London
EVGENY ADD | JC TROUBOUL | KSENIA SIC | LOUISE ALLEN | TIZIANO AUTERA | ULKU YILMAZ | LIZ KORI | RHIANNA CATT
Evgeny Add is a graphic artist from central Siberia who works in the genre of hyperrealism. “I believe that in the 21st century, a modern artist should keep pace with the times and try to use modern techniques and approaches in creating his works. There is no difference between then hand-brush or stylus from the tablet. The main idea of my works is a complete rethinking of existing real forms, creatures, people and other things for creating new compositions, new meanings. Compositions from the simplest forms give birth to new more complex things and meanings. The absence of a context gives rise to a certain identity, gives a fresh look to the habitual way of life. The human body is interesting in itself. Attention to detail gives an unlimited field for creativity. The process of degeneration of something complicated by means of splitting it into simple fragments gives a very interesting effect in the compartment with graphical means of expressiveness. In fact, this is a new visual language with a huge variation in everything that happens in the plot”.
Instagram: @evgenyadd
Jc Trouboul is a Spanish artist born in 1985. He showed an interest in art, particularly painting and drawing, from a young age. JC Trouboul studied architecture in Barcelona, and his love for art and design influenced much of his work. Artist JC Trouboul pays homage to ambassadors of British culture, power and compassion. Treated as royalty, JC Trouboul constructs through colour and texture the reflection of their resilient spirits. These two pieces were painted in unison, thought to work together or on their own.
Ksenia Sic is a Serbian born artist living and working in France. Ksenia has exhibited extensively in Europe since 2014 and has also completed Artist residences across Europe including in Switzerland, Iceland, Belgium and Finland. Her work incorporates acrylic and gold leaf on canvas, producing portraits that are visually striking. “In her art, Ksenia Sic is displacing herself as an observer. She does not paint portraits of certain specific individuals. Her paintings are neither representations or selfies. Each of her paintings is actually a portrait of the state of modern man and society as a whole, a society in which the illusion of the uniqueness of the Icon is unachievable on the horizon of the ocean of commonness” – Milan Poznanovic, Art historian.
Louise Allen began her life as an artist as a child. She studied faces wondering who she looked like. She painted and drew people, then after leaving Art School she embarked on a creative life. For years other opportunities and work took her away from portraits. After leaving her role as a Lecturer in Art she began to paint people again, finding her life experiences gave her a sense of ease as she gently observes the sitter’s character and works to create paintings that represent their whole self.
There is a unconscious nod to folk art in Louise’s work that is unintentional and was a curiosity to Louise. She recently learnt whilst painting her birth mother that her maternal grandmother was the first generation of Romany Gypsies to live in a house. Creating paintings and art was traditionally part of her gypsy family way of life.
Ulku Yilmaz is a Turkish artist who has exhibited extensively since 2005. The new series of deeply personal paintings by Istanbul-based artist Ülkü Yilmaz are a meditation on desire and lack as constitutive of the human subject. The artist has stated that though skulls play a prominent role in these paintings, these works are decidedly not in the vanitas tradition. Instead, they are in much closer by Melanie Klein which defines art as ‘passion transformed’. So, rather than meditating on the brevity of life, ethical concerns, futility, etc…, the skulls in these paintings represent sensuality, or, more specifically, a world of sentiment. In this sense, one could see these works as evoking the private world of Antigone, in that, Antigone does not give way on her desire.The figure in the painting is lovingly holding the skull, this remnant/memory of the body held in fidelity to the life cherished and loved, and she is keeping the skull for herself. In this act she is alienating the viewer, not leaving space for the viewer’s subjective interpretation. She never gives her full face to the viewer. The viewer must enter into the image and feel her experience, not interpret it through the lens of (art) history, but feel it in its immediacy. This approach to art is akin to both Francis Bacon’s project of ‘painting sensation’ and Baudelaire’s intention to be the ‘poet of nerves’.
Instagram: @ulkuyilmazstudio
Liz Kori is an artist from South London with a degree in BA Illustration. “My work is very bold and illustrative in its nature. For me, It’s all about the face; capturing human expressions and emotions in one shot. I use the contrast of bright colours and dark lines. I’m inspired by the cool flair of film noir, the vibrant colours of world cinema and lyrical poetry. There’s no perfection or imperfection when it comes to Art but I want to catch your eye and stop you in your tracks”.
www.lizkoriart.com | instagram:@london_painter_x | twitter:@londonpainterx
Rhianna Catt is a young British watercolour artist from London who loves to paint portraits, trying to express each person’s personality through each painting. She is completely self-taught through trial and error and the internet and is exhibiting for the first time in London. “When I sit down to paint I reach a certain point of calmness and a state of relaxation, where my inner most thoughts come to express themselves through my brush, as I spread the watercolour across the paper seeing my ideas and thoughts come to life; it is my way of trying to make sense of the world and people around me”.
Instagram: @rhiannacatt | Facebook: @rhiannacattart
If you wish to know more about our programme of exhibitions or if you want to become a future exhibitor email us at info@thebricklanegallery.com
