 Paul Morrison Cambium Morrison takes pleasure in destabilising the familiar. His works are relational through the recycling of particular elements from painting to painting. Although these elements are wholly recognisable, his compositions use the formal language of abstract painting including grids, splatters, zips and all over treatments. In these pictures we peer through cracks and gaps in fences and thickets to see what lies beyond. Simon Wallis, from the catalogue Chloroplast published by Walther König, 2002. aspreyjacques presents the second solo show of British artist Paul Morrison. Born in Liverpool (1966), Morrison has gained international recognition for his black and white landscape paintings and wall paintings with recent solo shows at UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Southampton City Art Gallery, Kunsthalle Nürnberg and forthcoming solos shows at the Kunstverein Ulm and Magasin, Grenoble. The title of the new show, Cambium, refers to a botanical term to describe the cellular tissue which annually increases the girth of exogenous trees and other plants. This confirms Morrison's quasi scientific fascination with nature which is often combined with a cartoon like or illustrative interpretation; drawing upon the achievements of landscape predecessors, from Dürer via Monet to Lichtenstein, to create abstracted and often magnified visions of landscape. By eliminating colour from his imagery, Morrison leaves the viewer to project his own associative vision onto the canvas utilising colour from behind the eye. Cambium will present Morrison’s largest painting to date along with a new film produced by SPIN. Paul Morrison's first film "Forest" was recently shown at Southampton City Art Gallery and the Kunsthalle Nürnberg. Morrison's approach to film making is similar to his handling of painting; fundamentally eclectic. The new film, projected on DVD, combines heavily modified footage from a number of feature films and cartoons ranging from "Marathon Man" and "The Evil Dead to Bambi and Fantasia". However, the footage used is not what one would first associate with the actual films and tends to focus on what Morrison terms the super natural. The tone of the resulting piece is dark, suggesting an idea of the aftermath or precursor to some horrific event. Like the paintings, the film is monochromatic yet manipulated in such a way that it is full of contrasts, introducing a new focus on light and shadow which is deliberately absent in the paintings where dramatic scale shifts often predominate. Paul Morrison, "Cognitive Landscape", published by aspreyjacques is available now. Ausstellungsdauer: 10.9. - 5.11.2002 Öffnungszeiten: Di-Fr 10 - 18 Uhr, Sa/So 10 – 13 Uhr aspreyjacques Gallery 4 Clifford Street GB-London W1X 1RB Telefon +44 020 7287 7675 Fax +44 020 7287 7674 E-Mail info@aspreyjacques.com www.aspreyjacques.com |
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