NYAB Event - Garth Evans Exhibition

Garth Evans Exhibition

Johannes Vogt Gallery

This event has ended.

Johannes Vogt Gallery presents the gallery’s first exhibition of British sculptor Garth Evans. Born in 1934 in the UK, Evans has produced an extensive body of work on both sides of the Atlantic over an active career beginning in the early 1960s. As narratives of British sculpture are reconsidered, Evans is emerging as one of the most creative and influential artists to bridge the generation of Anthony Caro with that of Evans’s students including Tony Cragg, Richard Deacon, Anthony Gormley and Bill Woodrow.

For his solo exhibition at the gallery, Evans presents two bodies of work. The first, Frames (Echoes), is a series of plywood sculptures from the early 1970s. In this series, a rectilinear frame takes the form of a domestic window. The form evolves organically over the sequenced works: the hard edges break down and project off the wall into the space of the gallery. The rigidity of the wood softens and bends, and its curved tendrils reach beyond the framed segments of the wall.

In addition to the wall-mounted series, Evans also presents a number of free-standing works from the 1980s. In these predominantly fiberglass works, Evans fabricates angular constructions, with planes intersecting and projecting from the floor. The surfaces are pigmented, drawing the eye to the smooth surfaces but augmenting the disjunction of planes. Although they offer themselves as simple constructions, the works demand attention, a consideration of their unusual geometry.

In both sets of works, Evans engages and surpasses the confines of geometric abstraction, thus fostering a dialogue with the viewer upon the idea of basic forms and structures versus the bodily experience of the sculptures in space. Through his sustained engagement with a limited format, and the conceptual rigor of his practice, Evans’s artistic production is embedded in the sculptural discourse of phenomenology and Minimalism, of Conceptual systems, and of the Constructivist approach to exploring form. In synthesizing these dynamic approaches, Evans stands out while yet being underrepresented, an example of formally exceptional work whose due audience and appreciation is only just beginning to come.

Garth Evans was born in Manchester, UK, in 1934 and settled in the USA at the midpoint of his career. He has exhibited widely in Europe and America since the early 1960s, and his work is represented in major public and private collections in Australia, Brazil, Portugal, USA and the UK, including MoMA, Metropolitan Museum, Brooklyn Museum, the Arts Council Collection, the British Museum, the Victoria&Albert Museum and the Tate. Evans has been the recipient of numerous awards as well as holding a number of distinguished teaching positions. Since 1988, he has taught at the Studio School in New York City where he is head of the sculpture department.

Evans was recently the subject of a solo museum show at the Longside Gallery of Yorkshire Sculpture Park, UK, organized by the British Arts Council and curated by Richard Deacon. Coinciding with this exhibition a comprehensive monograph with surveys on Evans’s entire practice by scholars such as Ann Compton, Michael Brenson and Jon Wood, while also featuring an introduction by the Director of the Tate, Penelope Curtis, has been published. Copies will be available for purchase at the gallery for $35.