Post by gamma888 on Apr 21, 2010 19:47:01 GMT -8
Baer Ridgway Exhibitions is pleased to present a solo exhibition of new paintings by Matthew Palladino. Palladino's work consists of the graphic, yet imaginative rendering of images of problematic and controversial social issues like gang violence, racial stereotyping, socio-sexual deviance or even mass cult suicide. Through the distillation and aestheticizing of these images, he removes the context from these issues, and through this removal clarifies them. Confronting these issues head on, simply and without affect or contrivance strips them of their deep cultural stigmas and forces the viewer to reinvent their notions of what these issues are. The pieces lack any clear political motivation, causing the viewer to recontextualize the images' ideological content through the unique lens of their own experience with the images. Eviscerating their political content and beautifying the images themselves with a sharp and crisp graphic style, Palladino attempts to alternately remove and reveal their meaning. It's ultimately his desire to explore the world and reveal its deeper meanings by straddling the line between hidden and exposed, and through this open up our mode of seeing. Palladino believes in the power of painting to show us more deeply what it is we see, and what it is to see.
www.baerridgway.com/
(addition 5/4/10):
Additional information by the gallery via email:
Baer Ridgway Exhibitions is pleased to present Wonder Box, a solo show of Matthew Palladino's latest paintings. Wonder Box references a 19th century viewing device containing exotic scenes that a small audience could see through a peephole for a nominal fee. It is in this vein that Palladino's new paintings are presented, a contemporary peep show where ideas of morality are disoriented and reconfigured in a playful fashion. The pieces lack any clear moral compass, causing the viewer to investigate the images' ideological content through the unique lens of their own experience. The gallery door becomes the hole and once entered, the viewer is within the Wonder Box for a peek at the artist's distorted scenes of the erotic, spiritual and mundane. Not unlike a private dancer at a peep show, these pieces, painted up and protected by a layer of glass ask the viewer to "..look, but don't touch."
www.baerridgway.com/
(addition 5/4/10):
Additional information by the gallery via email:
Baer Ridgway Exhibitions is pleased to present Wonder Box, a solo show of Matthew Palladino's latest paintings. Wonder Box references a 19th century viewing device containing exotic scenes that a small audience could see through a peephole for a nominal fee. It is in this vein that Palladino's new paintings are presented, a contemporary peep show where ideas of morality are disoriented and reconfigured in a playful fashion. The pieces lack any clear moral compass, causing the viewer to investigate the images' ideological content through the unique lens of their own experience. The gallery door becomes the hole and once entered, the viewer is within the Wonder Box for a peek at the artist's distorted scenes of the erotic, spiritual and mundane. Not unlike a private dancer at a peep show, these pieces, painted up and protected by a layer of glass ask the viewer to "..look, but don't touch."
