Thursday, November 25, 2010

Vertical light - Horizontal darkness





Top: Forgotten Angle - Ancient 200 x 100 cm - this one really spoke to me. It made me catch my breath with sadness. Unforgiving burnt oranges and deep blues.

Below: Invisible Filter - Illusion 112 x 284 cm - conversely, this lit up the room, as its impressive scale dominated one wall at the end of the gallery. It glowed and radiated freshness and joy.


The Falle Fine Art Gallery, Jersey recently hosted an exhibition of the British Post-war Abstract painter Paul John Kilshaw.

my opinion.
Following the celebration of perspective in traditional realism of the >16th century, Modernism rejected perspective and progressed to flatten images into basic compositions across two dimensions, for example in the work of Mondrian's De Stijl and Matisse's abstracts and collage. Gaining experience from the post-war anxiety and cultural liberation of American Abstract Expressionism and British Expressionists such as Bacon, British abstract painters began to regain a more painterly fashion in order to eradicate the restrictions of pretentiously clinical avant-garde of the early 20th century.

And now, as a new dawn of British Abstraction draws, perspective is making an unexpected return to our anarchist abstract. Seen in Kilshaw's work, the abstract curves of Picasso and Hepworth slide past one another like transparent filters - creating a new dimension that can be reached into. Explored. This is new abstract. Where Classicism and Modernism collide. Juxtaposing rigidity with weightlessness; expressive marks with solid objectivity. Nothing, and everything, makes sense. Every element of Kilshaw's work is informed, and refined. This is the true British Abstract of the Postmodern age.

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