Contemporary Art: History Believes Itself - Tom La Duke @ CRG Gallery, New York

(Drivebycuriosity) - Visiting art galleries is sometimes pure bliss. The CRG Gallery on New York´s Lower East Side (195 Christie Street crggallery) has an amazing show. The ambitious art dealer exhibits new work by Los Angeles-based artist Tom LaDuke. The show runs through April 24, 2016.

According to the press release LaDuke draws "references from art history, popular culture, and personal memories to create multi-layered objects and paintings." The artist "references Old Masters such as Dürer, Rubens, and Vermeer  by rendering each Old Master painting as a subtly blurred background on which thick impasto paint and a restrained use of embellishments like sequins and glitter both disrupt the smooth surface" (exhibitions). Here is a link to an article in the Los Angeles Times about LaDuke (latimes).


Anyway, I love the combination of shapes & colors. The paintings look like stills from science fiction movies I would like to see.

Above you can see "Collider" (2016, mixed media and acrylic on canvas over panel, 18 1/4 x 25 in. (46.4 x 63.5 cm) and a detail of it.

Above: "Dear tilt cam" (2016, mixed media and acrylic on canvas over panel, 32 x 21 1/2 in. (81.3 x 54.6 cm) plus a detail.












                                                             Split Universe

"Split Universe" (2016, mixed media and acrylic on canvas over panel 88 x 114 in. (223.5 x 289.6 cm) and a series of details. The press release explains LaDuke "draws inspiration from Velasquez’s Forge of Vulcan". And: "Velasquez’s painting fades to the background of Split Universe and sets the stage for a foreground that is a complex interplay between references to Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarves and renderings of photographs of the artist himself reflected off and obscured by the surface of various objects depicted in the painting. Additionally, the spatial references such as deep space, limited and flat space as well as representational and actual dimension (of the sequins for instance) within the painting seem to highlight".

"Forbidden Thoughts" (2015, acrylic on canvas over panel 13 3/4 x 17 1/2 in. (34.9 x 44.5 cm)

"ID" (2015, acrylic on canvas over panel 11 1/4 x 14 3/4 in. (28.6 x 37.5 cm) 

                                                        History Believes Itself

"Early Signs" (2016, mixed media and acrylic on canvas over panel 39 1/2 x 39 1/2 in. (100.3 x 100.3 cm) 

"History Believes Itself" (2016, mixed media and acrylic on canvas over panel 38 x 45 1/2 in. (96.5 x 115.6 cm).





                                                       Deer Fur & Finger Nails

The sculptures above are called "Happy Trail" (2016, silicone, deer fur, fingernail, flash, cyrano acrylate 19 ¾ x 7 x 10 ½ in. (50 x 18 x 27 cm) & "Wake" 2016, salt, hair, powder titanium pigment, cyrano acrylate 23 x 11 x 15 in. (58.4 x 27.9 x 38.1 cm). Sorry, don´t know the name of the black & white painting on the end. 

Enjoy!