GERTRUDE HERBERT HOSTS JOHN KINGERLEE EXHIBITION
The Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art is pleased to host an exhibition of abstract and figurative paintings by noted Anglo-Irish artist John Kingerlee, on view in the Main Gallery beginning January 16, 2009. Part of a three-year national touring project, the exhibition represents the first major American presentation of Kingerlee’s current work.
Curated by the late New York art critic William Zimmer, John Kingerlee: Recent Works is comprised of paintings created by the artist following his move to the remote, wind-blown Irish peninsula of Beara in 1982.
The exhibition includes figurative paintings, landscapes and grids, executed chiefly in oils, collage and mixed media. Kingerlee’s work has been significantly influenced by the stark landscape of rock, sky and sea of his Beara home, and he captures its essence in an almost abstract form. As a painter he often works quite slowly, adding as many as one hundred coats of paint to certain pieces over the course of several years. Among the focal points of the collection are works from the artist’s Grid series, in which each panel consists of a grid of color built up over an extended period of time, creating thick strata of paint that evoke Beara’s rugged coastal terrain. Kingerlee’s collage works, including a striking series of heads, incorporate found printed matter (stamps, ticket stubs, leaves from a favorite novel) with small drawings and figurative paintings. Commented New York critic John Mendelsohn, they read “like diaries that have been composed extemporaneously, as past and present layer and collide”.
John Kingerlee was born in Birmingham, England in 1936, and grew up in London. Largely self-taught, he began his career as a painter in the mid-1960s, and held his first exhibition in 1967 at the Ewan Maddox Gallery in London. His early representational works reflect the influence of Surrealism, particularly that of the Spanish painter Salvador Dali; other acknowledged sources of influence include Braque, Picasso, Klee and Danish artist Asger Jorn. In choosing to relocate to a remote, sparsely populated area where he could immerse himself entirely in his painting, Kingerlee largely removed himself from the public eye for several decades. Recent years, however, have seen a significant upsurge in appreciation for his work. Since 2002 his paintings have been featured in dozens of exhibitions in the United Kingdom, Spain, Canada, and the United States. 2006 saw the publication of Jonathan Benington’s Kingerlee, a major monograph on his work, followed by the production of a documentary film, What Lies Beneath.
An opening reception for John Kingerlee: Recent Works will be held on Friday, January 16 from 6:00 – 8:00 p.m. at the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art, 506 Telfair Street. The event is open to the public and free to Institute members; non-member admission to the reception is $5.00.
Noted New York art critic and scholar Dominique Nahas, who has spent time with Kingerlee at his home and studio in Ireland, will be in attendance at the reception to conduct a gallery talk on the artist’s work. Currently Associate Professor of Critical Studies at New York’s Pratt Institute, Mr. Nahas also serves on the faculty of the New York Studio Program and as Critic-in-Residence at the Maryland Institute College of Art’s Hoffberger School of Painting. His reviews appear regularly in Art in America, and he has authored hundreds of articles for major visual arts publications including ArtNews, Art on Paper, Art Asia Pacific and dArt International among many others.
John Kingerlee: Recent Works will remain on view in the Gertrude Herbert’s Main Gallery through February 27, 2009. The Institute’s galleries are open Tuesday–Friday from 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. and on Saturdays by advance appointment. Admission is free of charge. This exhibition was organized through Katharine T. Carter and Associates, New York.
For additional information or images of the artist’s work, please contact the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art at (706) 722-5495 or e-mail ghia@ghia.org.
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General Information
Founded in 1937, the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art is a non-profit art school and gallery housed in the historic (1818) Nicholas Ware Mansion (“Ware’s Folly”) and the c. 1907 Walker-Mackenzie Studio. The Institute’s galleries are open to the public Tuesday – Friday from 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. and on Saturdays by appointment only. Admission is free of charge. Programs of the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art are supported in part by the Georgia Council for the Arts (GCA) through appropriations of the Georgia General Assembly. GCA also receives support from its Partner Agency, the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional funding for the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art is provided by the City of Augusta through a grant administered by the Greater Augusta Arts Council.
