calendario eventi  :: 

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11/1/2013

Two exhibitions

Jonathan LeVine Gallery, New York

Aakash Nihalani
Portal

Jonathan LeVine Gallery is pleased to present Portal, a series of new works by New York-based artist Aakash Nihalani, in what will be his first solo exhibition at the gallery.

Known in the street art community for his fluorescent tape interventions, Nihalani combines a bright color palette with geometric abstract shapes, resulting in striking contrasts within the context of the urban landscape. Expanding on his exploration of form and space, the artist continues to build upon this body of work in his studio practice, through works on canvas and wooden panels.

Nihalani’s bold, flat shapes continue to evolve into complex multi-dimensional patterns, often producing intricate optical illusions that challenge the viewer’s relationship with their surrounding environment. The imagery appears to extend or recede from the surface of the picture plane through the artist’s carefully developed variations on color theory and architectural elements with influences of Op art and Mathematical perspectives.

The artist enjoys the interactive effect of his work in the gallery setting as well as on the street. His exhibitions often include site-specific installations created with tape, similar to his public interventions, which complement his paintings and freestanding sculptures. The accessible quality of Nihalani’s imagery connects with a wide audience, much like the adhesive nature of his original medium.

In Nihalani’s words, “I try to create a new visual space within the physical confines of any piece I work on, through the illusion of three-dimensional imagery contained on a two-dimensional plane. When looking at the work—orientation shifts, shapes merge, direction inverts, foreground becomes background and vice versa. In observing the differences in how we process this information, one becomes aware of how subjective perception can be and how we choose to view reality, individually.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Aakash Nihalani was born in 1986 in Queens, New York and is currently based in Brooklyn. In 2008, he received a BFA from Steinhardt School, New York University (NYU). In 2012, he was awarded a residency at the Willem de Kooning studio, located in East Hampton, NY. Nihalani’s colorful geometric-based work spans across sculpture, multimedia, interactive video, street interventions and photography, it has been exhibited internationally and featured in a number of publications including: The New York Times, The Times of India and Vogue India.

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Haroshi
Virtual Reality
Gallery II

Jonathan LeVine Gallery is pleased to present Virtual Reality, a series of new works by Tokyo-based Japanese artist Haroshi, in what will be his second solo exhibition at the gallery.

Haroshi creates three-dimensional wooden sculptures with used skateboard decks as his primary medium. He often uses the wheels and other hardware parts as accents, even the grip tape for a sanding tool. He achieves a vibrant striped pattern by stacking the boards with keen attention to the exposed rails (outer edges). After a careful selection process, he stacks decks into layers, cutting them into cubes to form mosaics patterns, assembles them into a desired shape and meticulously carves each form by hand with an uncanny level of skill and precision. Themes in this exhibition include concepts familiar to any skater or artist such as: injury, recovery, obsession, perseverance, healing and growth.

Haroshi does not apply any paint or pigment to his materials, allowing the bright colors of the decks to serve as his palette, since skateboards are made of processed plywood—pressed into molded shapes and printed with graphics. He occasionally incorporates the splintered edges of broken boards into his otherwise extremely polished work, creating textural contrast between the smooth silhouettes and sharp raw edges. The artist has also been known to hide small objects inside of his works, following the traditional practice of ancient Japanese Buddha sculptors, documenting the effect using X-ray technology.

This year marks Haroshi’s 10th Anniversary in using skateboards as a medium in his fine artwork. His exhibition title, Virtual Reality, is a reference to the classic 1993 skate video from Plan B, in which pro-skater Rodney Mullen displayed tricks that made a lasting impression. At the time (twenty years ago), Haroshi recalls his perception of the United States as an exciting, distant place that he had not yet explored, and how the content in that video pushed his understanding of the sport that had become his passion. In the artist’s words: “It made me realize that the potential of skateboarding knows no limits.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Haroshi, born in 1978, is a self-taught Japanese artist, currently based in Tokyo. As a passionate skater from his early teens to present, Haroshi possesses a thorough knowledge of the anatomy of a skateboard and all of its parts including the deck, trucks and wheels, which he uses as materials for his sculptures. With no formal art training, Haroshi adapted the determined perseverance, freedom of expression and DIY ethos of skate culture, into creating works of art.

Image: Haroshi, Skull (Side view)

Press inquiries:
Maléna Seldin 212-243-3822 malena@jonathanlevinegallery.com

Jonathan LeVine Gallery
529 West 20th Street, 9th Floor New York, NY 10011
Open Tuesday through Saturday, 11am to 6pm

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