Gloaming Breaks
Store Review (0)PRESENTED BY : Brutal.
Frame | Framed in Kiaat |
---|---|
Medium | Acrylic on Canvas |
Location | Cape Town , South Africa |
Height | 155.00 cm |
Width | 133.00 cm |
Artist | MJ Lourens |
Year | 2024 |
Gloaming Breaks is the first in an upcoming body of large scale
canvas works by MJ Lourens. It is a deliberate choice on the
artist's part to now produce paintings that are commanding in
scale, style and subject matter.
Portrait format is a particularly bold choice for this work. It serves
to draw the viewer in, beckoning you to step through the frame
into the world of the image. That world is both real and surreal,
both urban in scope and yet the foreground where the viewer
floats upon the earth is pastoral. We enter this landscape in
darkness and then soar over it towards the dawn.
All of these contrasts speak to Lourens' artistic relationship to the
modern world. The depth and richness of these new paintings
explores how so much of contemporary life contains its own
opposite. We are more connected than ever and yet isolation is
prevalent. As cities expand, they impede on the natural spaces
where we thrive.
These themes have always informed Lourens' approach to
painting, but past work has embraced melancholy as a primary
emotional foundation. Here, Lourens lands on the side of hope.
There are large green spaces in this city. Warm blooming yellows
and soft pinks pulse through inhabited areas that feel full, but
never congested. The artist's signature pixelation in the sky is
usually a suggestion of distortion, but here a stately stone pine
intentionally breaks more of the sky than the pixels. Life wins out.
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