Works LOCATION contact
12/07/24 - 02/08/24
Social Tapestry
Social Tapestry
12/07/24 - 02/08/24
Conor Dowdle~KV Duong~Ned Elliott~Atticus Gordon~Raina Seung Eun Jung~Pedro Montilla~Mariana Sanchez~Isabella Sartori~Alex Sutcliffe~Bryant McLaughlin Van-Low~Deanio X
Chilli Art Projects are pleased to present Social Tapestry, an ambitious and expansive group show which brings together artists exploring layering, weaving, collage and construction in their own unique ways. These works all build spaces and environments - redefining and reimagining every day life and experiences to form tapestries that reflect on the contemporary moment. Whether through research or play, spatial relationships between individuals, objects, and environments are all explored. Painterly moments of chance meet highly choreographed interventions, combining to create richly layered works - both physically and metaphorically.~~The age old trope of the painter as alchemist is addressed almost immediately in the works of Pedro Montilla, who views painting as somewhat of a coalescence between science and magic. His coarse yet delicate ‘fiques’ reference both figure and environment without lapsing into the representational. Deanio X shares a similar ethos - mixing pigments to craft rippled, liquid surfaces with a beautiful depth and patina. These diasporic portraits pluck narratives and people from a history of marks. ~~This wrestle between the figurative and the abstract also plays out in the works of Ned Elliott, whose delicate pastel surfaces create a haziness from which figurative elements emerge. Elliott’s works are punctuated by collaged flowers, which sit in harmony with his gestural yet delicate, sometimes traceless marks. This more gestural approach is seen in the works of KV Duong, who masterfully blends print and paint to construct latex windows from which people and gesture emerge. Duong’s practice is rooted in his lived experience and Vietnamese heritage - the use of latex cleverly engaging with the historical dynamics of rubber plantations during the era of French colonisation in Vietnam. Bryant McLaughlin Van-Low’s practice is similarly research-led. Informed by his background in city planning, his research based paintings look to engage with social art practices, in order to challenge the complex interplay between social structures, cultural practices, and materiality. ~~Conor Dowdle’s warming paintings are equally engaged with the fabric of our society, as he investigates visual culture through a study of historical painting typologies - depictions of social space, alongside notions of heroism and intimacy. In doing so, Dowdle’s works sit nicely between the contemporary lived experience and historical artistic tropes. Atticus Gordon is similarly engaged with the history of painting, namely how it shifts and exists under the current conditions of capital, technology, and culture. Borrowing from art history, social media feeds and online community forums, Gordon explores what it means to participate in the digital ether. His works take on an almost cosmic, universal feel - where fractured narratives pop up and unfold across the surface of pre-existing ones.~~Both born and raised in Ottawa, Canada, Gordon and Alex Sutcliffe explore the contemporary image sphere and how it engages with the historical. Sutcliffe’s precise, slick paintings bring to mind the aesthetic of the digital itself - these works feel just as at home on a screen as they do on a gallery wall. He effectively emphasises the illusionary qualities of both painting and the digital space, with a focus on the interplay of surface, texture, and layering processes. Isabella Sartori’s delicate, process-driven paintings are also carefully layered - building up slowly over a series of months, as Sartori moves her source imagery away from its representative qualities into a tapestry of painterly chance. Slowly obliterating the image into abstracted fields and layers of colour, she creates a final surface that is rich in depth, slowly soaking into the viewer - an experience somewhat at odds with contemporary image culture.~~Finally, the show is brought together by the sculptures of Raina Seung Eun Jung, whose reflective steel surfaces echo collective concerns and observations. These weighty, crude works are smeared with oil paint - reflecting her interest in the contemporary technological landscape and expressing it through primitive actions - somewhat reminiscent of the gestural nature of trackpads and touch screens.
Conor Dowdle
Vestigial Ideal, 2024~Oil on canvas, 60x50cm
KV Duong
Untitled (White Poles) No 2, 2024~Acrylic on latex, pumice medium, painted wooden stretcher, 198x100 cm
Ned Elliot
Flash of a Moth, 2024~Soft pastel on paper in a handmade frame, 79x104cm (unframed)
Atticus Gordon
Gazing, 2024~Oil on canvas, 150x120cm
Pedro Montilla
Slow Burn, 2024~Oil, distemper and beeswax on fique, 220x160cm
Mariana Sanchez
May 16th, 2024~Oil & transfer ink on canvas, 90x120cm
Isabella Sartori
Carl Juniors (Giverny), 2024~Oil on canvas, 122x127cm
Alex Sutcliffe
Daydream, 2024~Oil, acrylic on panel, 91x121cm
Bryant McLaughlin Van-Low
Untitled (Pork Chop Hill), 2024~Dye on burlap, 100x100cm
Deanio X
Prism, 2024~Mixed media on canvas, 92x120cm
Chilli
1 Adelaide Road, Chalk Farm
London, NW3 3QE
By appointment only
info@chilliartprojects.com