“Abstract Paintings” Exhibition
Van Der Plas Gallery
This event has ended.
Van Der Plas presents its next exhibition: Timothy Atticus and Leonardo Barreto: Abstract Paintings. This exhibition features new work by Timothy Atticus and Leonardo Barreto, all of which are being shown publicly for the first time. Atticus’ work blurs the line between painting and printmaking, drawing inspiration from art of the seventeenth century. Barreto, who describes himself as a “neo-Abstract Expressionist,” likes to recycle rules of artists of the New York School, specifically from circa 1957, when he was born. Atticus and Barreto — two artists of two generations with strikingly different methods — question the possibilities of abstract painting in a digital age. Atticus (born 1987, Little Rock, Arkansas) is a New York based artist who has worked across mediums. His sound piece, Dig a Hole: Directions on How to Build a Garden for the Deranged was first recognized nationally in the 2008 Whitney Biennial’s Radio Show. He received his BFA at The Cooper Union School of Arts and Sciences, where he practiced performance, as well as focusing on sculpture and painting. With his latest body of work — black and metallic paintings, Atticus has borrowed Baroque pictorial conventions and subject matter from Rembrandt’s prints. Starting with small-format intaglio prints as his source, he inverts their scale and goes abstract, while maintaining an emphasis on line, light and monochrome. His mixed-media works blend in drawing and printmaking materials, such as graphite powder and silkscreen paint. He states: “The color is extremely important. I use silver as a ground because it literally references a zinc plate being carved into and because of its luminous properties…Light is equally important as color.” Barreto (born in Managua, Nicaragua) lives in San José, Costa Rica. Barreto’s use of black and white stems from his background in photography, having studied at the International Center for Photography in New York. Following graduation, he worked as an assistant in a photography studio, documenting the work of the painter Willem de Kooning,
whose work left a particular impression on him. Like de Kooning, Barreto paints in layers and works on his canvases from more than one side. He approaches his acrylic canvases with no plan or sketch, and says that if he paints with something specific in mind, he gets into trouble. He likes to use cooking utensils and non-painting tools purchased at the hardware store. Regarding his work, he says: “It has remained abstract from day one…Everything comes from the painting as if excavating, digging forms and shapes or arranging rocks on a beach. The mind on an expedition to construct from found hues and textures of pigmented glue.”
-Deborah A. Goldberg Ph.D
Media
Schedule
from March 28, 2014 to June 30, 2014
Opening Reception on 2014-03-28 from 18:00 to 20:00