Two exhibitions
dal 29/3/2004 al 23/5/2004
Segnalato da
Raoul De Keyser
Artlab
Merlin Carpenter
Nigel Cooke
Gary Hume
Andrew Grassie
Callum Innes
Merlin James
Ian Monroe
Victoria Morton
Vicken Parsons
Michael Raedecker
David Rayson
George Shaw
Lucy Skaer
David Thorpe
29/3/2004
Two exhibitions
Whitechapel, London
Flemish artist Raoul De Keyser paints highly personal works that hover between abstraction and reality. His quiet but masterful presence has been an inspiration for generations of European painters – yet this is his first major survey in the UK and the largest exhibition of his work to date. To complement the first major UK survey of Raoul De Keyser, the Whitechapel showcases the exciting work of a younger generation of artists working in Britain today. Edge of the Real features the work of 15 established and emerging artists, whose figurative work is developed from a starting point of abstraction, and who deploy materials ranging from thread to Humbrol enamel paint.
Raoul De Keyser
Flemish artist Raoul De Keyser paints highly personal works that hover between abstraction and reality. His quiet but masterful presence has been an inspiration for generations of European painters – yet this is his first major survey in the UK and the largest exhibition of his work to date.
Like a series of haiku poems his beautiful compositions evoke fleeting impressions of the world – the network of veins on a leaf, bruised skin, the glimpse of a room - but they are all abstract. The roots of his work lie in both Pop Art and Minimalism. Inspired by everything from the architecture of his house near Ghent to the markings on football pitches, aeroplane vapour trails to clothes on a washing line, De Keyser’s subject matter is always close to home. At the same time his rigorous use of pure colour, line and space triggers both a physical and surprisingly emotional response.
The elegant simplicity of his paintings conceals the struggle and experiment embedded in every canvas, as colours are repainted and surfaces overlaid. ‘I don’t want to become the ‘pretty’ painter... Ultimately I want to paint ruthlessly’ (De Keyser, 2002). Featuring over 80 paintings from 1963 to the present day this retrospective charts Raoul De Keyser’s life-long engagement with the physicality of paint and the ephemerality of images.
Admission free
Raoul de Keyser has been co-organised by the Whitechapel Gallery; Musée de Rochechouart, France; De Pont Foundation, Tilburg, Netherlands; Fundação Serralves, Porto, Portugal; and Kunstmuseum St.Gallen, Switzerland.
Image: Raoul de Keyser, Surplace nr.2, 2002
oil on canvas
70 x 80 cm
MDD - Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens, Deurle, Belgium
Raoul De Keyser is funded by
Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation
With generous support from
Ministry for he Flemish Community
With kind assistance from
Belgian Embassy
Flanders House 'Flemish Representation'
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Edge of the Real – A Painting Show
To complement the first major UK survey of Flemish painter Raoul De Keyser, the Whitechapel showcases the exciting work of a younger generation of artists working in Britain today.
Edge of the Real features the work of 15 established and emerging artists, whose figurative work is developed from a starting point of abstraction, and who deploy materials ranging from thread to Humbrol enamel paint. With a series of fascinating images that hover between reality and abstraction, these contemporary British painters generate striking echoes with the work of Raoul de Keyser.
Taking as their subject matter their immediate surroundings – a suburban estate, a car park, a pile of discarded newspapers, billboards and even empty galleries – the familiar is translated into formal compositions of form, colour and line. The immediate simplicity of the paintings and domestic feel belies their deeply referential nature, as artists cite modern masters such as Mondrian or Charles Rennie Macintosh and movements from Constructivism to Social Realism.
The artists will each be represented by 1 work, in a 'salon' style hang, and they are: Artlab (C. Cullinan + J. Richards), Merlin Carpenter, Nigel Cooke, Gary Hume, Andrew Grassie, Callum Innes, Merlin James, Ian Monroe, Victoria Morton, Vicken Parsons, Michael Raedecker, David Rayson, George Shaw, Lucy Skaer, and David Thorpe.
- Edge of the Real - A Painting Show is originated by the Whitechapel and curated by Iwona Blazwick, Director, Whitechapel, and Anthony Spira, Curator, Whitechapel.
- On 31 March 2004 Channel 4 will unveil a special commission by Lucy Skaer as part of its ART4 collection, comprising of four unlimited edition lithographic posters entitled A Long Second Divided into Two Pairs (2004). Channel 4 will also unveil a new commission by Simon Periton.
Exhibition opening hours: Tuesday – Sunday 11am – 6pm
Late night Thursdays until 9pm. The Whitechapel will be open for Easter weekend, 9 – 12 April 2004. Admission free
Whitechapel, Whitechapel High Street, London E1
Nearest tube Aldgate East
Tel +44 (0)20 7522 7888
Recorded information +44 (0)20 7522 7878