Stuart Cumberland
06 Sep - 14 Oct 2007
STUART CUMBERLAND
"Congratulations"
The Approach is proud to present 'Congratulations', an exhibition of new work by the British painter Stuart Cumberland.
A group of figurative and abstract canvases will be shown relating to an ongoing theme of the painter as a light-hearted egotist striving to be rewarded for his artistic endeavour. The paintings here primarily deal with rivalry, desire and self- gratification, painted with one eye on the canvas and one on the competition.
The motifs within the paintings that make up 'Congratulations' range from champagne bottles, limbs and chequered flags to posing bikini clad female figures. These symbols of celebration and glamour can sometimes be read as props and subjects in paintings of 'Still Life' and 'Nude'- genres frequently respected and mocked in equal measures by Cumberland. Another re-occurring image is that of a Rembrandt look-alike, studiously painting away. Figures and objects are rendered with speed and a cartoon-like quality but the scale of the works and their conviction gives them sincere edge that evokes a steady serious practice. The repetitive motif is exaggerated in these new paintings by the use of stencils to draw an outline of the bottles, which are brashly filled in with colour, bringing to mind a child's colouring-in book. These paintings have an immediacy of execution, which is defiantly frontal and flat but continue to dig deeper, reflecting the artist's dilemma to produce a serious painting without taking things too seriously.
Recent solo shows include: 'Stuart Cumberland', Kate MacGarry, London 2006 and 2003. Recent group shows include: 'The Wonderful Fund-Collecting Art for the New Millennium', Pallant House Gallery, West Sussex (2006-7); 'The Way We Work Now: Some Attitudes to Materials and Making', Camden Arts Centre, London (2006); 'Works on Paper', Sprüth Magers Projekte, Münich (2004); 'Dirty Pictures', The Approach, London (2003); 'Painter's Painting', The Approach, London (2001)
"Congratulations"
The Approach is proud to present 'Congratulations', an exhibition of new work by the British painter Stuart Cumberland.
A group of figurative and abstract canvases will be shown relating to an ongoing theme of the painter as a light-hearted egotist striving to be rewarded for his artistic endeavour. The paintings here primarily deal with rivalry, desire and self- gratification, painted with one eye on the canvas and one on the competition.
The motifs within the paintings that make up 'Congratulations' range from champagne bottles, limbs and chequered flags to posing bikini clad female figures. These symbols of celebration and glamour can sometimes be read as props and subjects in paintings of 'Still Life' and 'Nude'- genres frequently respected and mocked in equal measures by Cumberland. Another re-occurring image is that of a Rembrandt look-alike, studiously painting away. Figures and objects are rendered with speed and a cartoon-like quality but the scale of the works and their conviction gives them sincere edge that evokes a steady serious practice. The repetitive motif is exaggerated in these new paintings by the use of stencils to draw an outline of the bottles, which are brashly filled in with colour, bringing to mind a child's colouring-in book. These paintings have an immediacy of execution, which is defiantly frontal and flat but continue to dig deeper, reflecting the artist's dilemma to produce a serious painting without taking things too seriously.
Recent solo shows include: 'Stuart Cumberland', Kate MacGarry, London 2006 and 2003. Recent group shows include: 'The Wonderful Fund-Collecting Art for the New Millennium', Pallant House Gallery, West Sussex (2006-7); 'The Way We Work Now: Some Attitudes to Materials and Making', Camden Arts Centre, London (2006); 'Works on Paper', Sprüth Magers Projekte, Münich (2004); 'Dirty Pictures', The Approach, London (2003); 'Painter's Painting', The Approach, London (2001)