Chris Gollon: Gimme Some Wine IAP Advantageous Artwork

This on-line exhibition has been curated to coincide with Eleanor  McEvoy’s newest album ‘Gimme Some Wine’, the title observe of which impressed this final nice collection of work on a theme by Chris Gollon  (1953-2017), culminating, after many and numerous research, in an exquisitely touching ‘Last Model’. However that’s the top – we must always begin in the beginning with ‘Examine on Canvas (II)’, 2017, which units the scene.

Delicate portrayals of girls had all the time performed a big half in Gollon’s oeuvre – MRB

A tabletop is suffering from the paraphernalia of ingesting,  harshly illuminated by a obvious electrical gentle bulb, a half-full decanter of purple wine, six half-empty glasses, two knaves of hearts, all set towards a louring midnight-blue background. Enjoying playing cards often happen in Gollon’s work, a reminder that life’s a chancy enterprise. By the way, McEvoy and Gollon had been each admirers of Picasso’s Blue Interval; intense blue, brushed via with a scumbling of turquoise are the dominant colors in an ideal most of the Research.

A big forged of characters comes and goes. Primarily girls, they vary from the cheerful to the melancholic, from the grief-stricken to the resigned. In ‘Examine on Paper (VI)’, 2016, the lady is accompanied by a canine whose soulful expression matches her personal. She cradles the canine’s head in a single arm, her different arm,  terminating in an infinite skeletal hand, encircles a half-empty glass of wine, a decanter comfortingly shut by.  The outsized fingers in a number of of the Research is one other reference to Picasso – specifically, his tragic portrait of ‘The Outdated Guitarist’, 1903-04.

Delicate portrayals of girls had all the time performed a big half in Gollon’s oeuvre, and the 2 years of boundary-crossing with Eleanor McEvoy elevated that sensitivity. The ‘Gimme some Wine’ collection is the climax of a nineteen-year curiosity in creative boundary-crossing, having beforehand collaborated with Thurston Moore and the Chinese language classical virtuoso Yi Yao.

Gollon’s work needs to be seen within the context of North European  Portray. He’s inheritor to the custom which produced painters reminiscent of Breughel and Bosch, with whom he shares a need to show man’s capability for folly. Beckmann’s disaster-laden triptychs additionally come to thoughts, as do the sinuous figures of El Greco.

Unpeopled research additionally happen through which the decanter and glasses carry out a stately minute towards a darkish background, generally illuminated by a single gentle bulb, extra typically by a watery moon. In a number of of them, the carafe takes on a lifetime of its personal, bending and stretching till lastly, in desperation,  cork flies out. Gollon has inserted a enjoying card in each one in all this collection simply to guarantee that we, too, are nonetheless enjoying the sport.

Fairly completely different in color, with a consequent change in temper, are two tall seated figures: ‘Gimme Some Wine (Male & Feminine  Variations), 2016. The darkish brown acrylic paint (male) is brushed onto the canvas with nice sweeping strokes; a lighter, orangey-brown oil paint (feminine) is brushed onto the canvas with smaller,  round strokes. The color is a nod within the path of Rembrandt,  one other of Gollon’s painter-heroes. Though the pose is hieratic,  there’s nothing heroic in regards to the crumpled fits and dejected air of the couple. He’s actually worn down by grief, tears pouring from his eyes, however he will probably be redeemed by LOVE, which is referred to in wobbly letters encircling the decanter and glass on a small desk at his facet. A tiny enjoying card, the ace of hearts half-hidden, gives a beacon of hope for his future. No such reprieve for his associate, nevertheless, whose profile reveals despairing acquiescence in  her doom, no matter it could be, betokened by the ace of golf equipment.

Gollon’s method with acrylic was notably modern:  he used a combination of Outdated Grasp methods – very skinny glazes alongside spray paints and even printmakers’ rollers to realize his highly effective imagery.

The crescendo of this collection is reached in ‘Gimme some Wine (The  Get together)’, 2017, though no person seems to be having fun with themselves very a lot. 4 of the ladies from the Research reappear right here, one gazing her palm as if making an attempt to divine her future, one other gazing mournfully into area, one more handed clear out, her unconscious hand around the decanter simply to ensure. A sinister ritual is going down off to at least one facet: what seems to be a voodoo determine is making obeisance to what could also be a headless rooster; equally probably, it may be learn as a conventional Madonna and Little one.

The Queen of Spades is the genius presiding over this unedifying scene. The theme and variations now having come to a climax of joyless enjoyment in ‘The Get together’, Gollon offers us peace and determination in ‘Gimme Some Wine (Last Model)’, 2017. The ugly drunk has metamorphosed right into a serene sleeper, and there we go away her,  poised on the sting of darkness. The Queen of Spades, illuminated by a unadorned electrical bulb, has accompanied her right here, a silent witness to her dreamless sleep.

Phrases: Mary Rose Beaumont Images Courtesy IAP Advantageous Artwork

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