Untitled, 2006 (red figure carrying lifeless girl wearing yellow dress), Ink and mixed media on paper, 71 x 90,5 cm Neil Farber Pinkeyes MOGADISHNI CPH is proud to present the solo exhibition "Pinkeyes" by Neil Farber. On the surface Farber's works have an almost naïve lightness to them, which is connected with the artist’s cartoon like or children's book like aesthetics. But the mode of expression, which seems both "awkward" and seductive at the same time, cannot hide a number of gloomier, more complex and morbid layers of content. This fact is revealed in the title "Pinkeyes", which not only refers to a detail in the motive of one of the colourful drawings but also is a direct reference to an inflammation in the conjunctiva of the eye. Illness and death are recurrent themes in Farber's new works on paper, in which his well-known, peculiar, round headed figures seem to multiply like harmful cells - or spread like an epidemic - across the picture surface. The unpretentiousness and innocence of the works are being infected by something dangerous, disturbing and absurd, and the simple, expressive line is added a notable weight. In the twinkling of an eye small transparent blots of running paint are transformed to swirling, absorbing water masses or to streams of blood from cut-off heads and the hair on the back of the viewer’s neck begin to bristle. The threats against the self or humanity are manifold, and with "Pinkeyes" Farber wrestles with both inner and outer demons and - with an equal amount of awe and mocking irony - faces our mutual feeling of anxiety. We are all in the firing line and the ideas for little, eeriness-causing narrative sequences, which thematize our vulnerability, seem to almost pile up inside the artist: bodies hang from an atomic cloud like fruits on a tree, human beings are transported like goods on container ships and characters with smeared features are acting as targets for long wooden lances. Farber's surreal, obscure imagery with its varicoloured "overpopulation" of tiny people, frogs, rats, snakes, captured maidens, dragons, cats and ghosts belongs on the border line between childhood fear and grown-up fantasy and act as the basis for a dramatic description of the darker aspects of the human psyche. Aspects, which are disturbing and upsetting - perhaps even nightmarishly evil - but nonetheless serve as an integrated part of our identity. And on closer inspection may appear to contain certain redeeming qualities - like the vampire with the dejected look on its face, standing forth as a victim itself. Neil Farber enjoys great recognition and has shown internationally both as a solo artist and as part of the infamous comic collective "The Royal Art Lodge," which was founded in 1996 and in addition to Farber also includes Michael Dumontier and Farber’s nephew Marcel Dzama. In the last two years Farber has exhibited both at Clementine Gallery (N.Y.), Richard Heller Gallery (Santa Monica), Houldsworth (London) and Alice Day Gallery (Brussels). His works has been widely reproduced, most recently on the cover of "Comic Release: Negotiating Identity for a New Generation" and in a monograph published by Richard Heller. Exhibition: October 26 - November 25, 2006 Gallery hours: Tues-Fri 11am - 4pm, Sat 12am - 3pm MOGADISHNI CPH Carl Jacobsens Vej 16, entrance 6, floor 3 DK-2500 Valby Telephone +45 32 54 35 35 Fax +45 32 54 35 45 Email mail@mogadishni.com www.mogadishni.com |
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