 Fiona Rae New Paintings click here for english text Fiona Rae (*1963) wurde in Hong Kong geboren, sie lebt und arbeitet in London. Mit ihren Studienkollegen Damian Hirst, Julian Opie und Gary Hume gehört sie zur Gruppe von Künstlerinnen und Künstlern, welche in den späten 80er Jahren einer jungen britischen Kunstszene internationale Aufmerksamkeit verschaffte. Die Schlagworte des "Brit Pop" oder schlicht der "Goldsmith Generation" bezeichnen diesen bemerkenswerten Aufbruch. Rae konnte sich in den 90er Jahren eine eigenständige Position als Künstlerin erarbeiten und das Medium der Malerei weiterhin als spannende künstlerische Ausdrucksform zur Diskussion stellen. Der "Hunger nach Bildern" schien am Ende der 80er Jahre schon einigermassen gestillt zu sein und die "wilden Maler" wurden durch ihren Erfolg besänftigt, als ein neuer Impuls aus Grossbritannien kam. Es waren demnach auch andere Quellen und Bezugsfelder, die Rae und ihre Kollegen für sich nutzbar machten. Fiona Rae hat sich die Rhetorik und bildsprachlichen Mittel von definitionsmächtigen Malern angeeignet, beispielsweise von de Kooning und Richter, und benutzt sie zur Formulierung ihrer eigenen Position. Ironie und zitathafte Verweise ermöglichten es ihr virtuos zu malen und ein fragiles Gleichgewicht zwischen Analyse, Expression und Synthese zu schaffen. Mit den Bildflächen ihrer neuen Malereien öffnet Fiona Rae einen flach geschichteten Bildraum für ein schillernden Netz von Icons und Visuals. Diese sind uns vielfach als graphische Oberflächen von Gebrauchsgegenständen und aus der Werbung vertraut. Alltägliche, triviale Typografien verdichtet sie so zu komplexen visuellen Welten, deren illuminierte Zeichen die Oberfläche ihrer Malereien aktivieren. Es sind herausfordernde Zustandsbilder aktueller Wahrnehmungsmentalitäten, die Fiona Rae auf grossformatigen Leinwänden fixiert. (Text: Kurt Kladler) Ausstellungsdauer: 25.8. - 29.9.2001 Oeffnungszeiten: Di-Fr 12-18 Uhr, Sa 11-16 Uhr Galerie Bob van Orsouw Löwenbräu-Areal Limmatstrasse 270 8005 Zürich Telefon: 01 273 11 00 Fax: 01 273 11 02 E-Mail: mail@bobvanorsouw.ch Fiona Rae New Paintings The light of bright moments extinguishes on the surface of black depths and leaves only glittering traces behind. A spray of mist shrouds enigmatic signs and symbols glide by, as in the days of early childhood when the cosmos of meanings was not yet linked to letters and words. The British artist Fiona Rae was born in Hong Kong in 1963, surrounded by signs, memories of which still seem to linger on in the present of her most recent works. Rae lives and works in London. Like the friends from her student days, Damian Hirst, Julian Opie and Gary Hume, she is part of that group of artists who put young British art in the international map in the late 1980s. Catchy names the "Brit Pop" or simply the "Goldsmith Generation" may still resonate, but it is possible they have already been drowned out by the exhibition titles that laud what was indeed a remarkable new beginning as a "Sensation" (1997) – which in itself makes the position Fiona Rae occupies with her latest works all the more remarkable. Compared to her previous works, they have a calmer air, the earlier expressive gesture seems to have decelerated and become a controlled movement, indeed the whole tempo is different. In the early days powerful brushstrokes and a mass of paint brought disparate elements to a fragile halt, holding them steady for a moment, before they were propelled out of the picture plane again as though by an explosion. But this was not the only movement. On the contrary and opaque red, for example, lay close to a web of deep blue streaks of colour, encircling amorphous bodies. Light-footed traces of a repeatedly interrupted painterly gesture disappeared in the background, contrasting with the might of supremely confident brushwork. In between there were fine trails of colour, making the interstices their own. That may sound dramatic and in many ways the work was just that. But on closer examination it becomes clear that Rae’s powerful statements should not be understood as a direct translation of emotional states. She has in part availed herself of the rhetorics and pictorial vocabulary of the definitive styles of artists such as de Kooning and Richter, but she uses these to articulate her own position. With its irony and allusive quotation her early works were distinctly virtuosic, and although the present pictures are clearly different, the processes she used in the past still hold good. It seems that the arena of allusion has shifted, from the body of painting to the glittering net of icons and visuals. New, challenging signs and anarchic gods are appearing in the bright neon-lit skies of our daily lives. Graphic designs by groups such as "The Designers Republic" (Sheffield) and "Tomato" (London), to name but two, have had a lasting effect on our visual perceptions. We live in an ambience of silent "visual sound" flowing around us, accompanying the fluid ornamentation of our towns and cities with its moving lights signs and signals. In her new paintings Fiona Rae takes the picture surface and turns it into a planar, layered pictorial space for elements of this drift of signs. Letters from an unknown alphabet and everyday, trivial typographies alike become complex visual worlds: illuminated signs activate the surface of her pictures. Thus she follows the migration of meanings in their lexical form and captures fleeting evidence of current modes and mentalities of perception. (Text by Kurt Kladler) Exhibition from August 25 until September 29, 2001 Opening hours: Tu-Fr 12 am - 6 pm, Sa 11 am - 4 pm Gallery Bob van Orsouw Löwenbräu-Areal Limmatstrasse 270 CH-8005 Zurich phone +41 1 273 11 00 Fax +41 1 273 11 02 E-Mail: mail@bobvanorsouw.ch |
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