Aaron Johnson
Aaron Johnson’s New Paintings at Joshua Liner Gallery are amazing. The works are like a family photo album of Grosz’, Kirchner’s, Goya’s and Picasso’s. Each painting features piles of twisted knotted faces. Stacks and grids of portraits with no bodies is a format we are used to seeing by 2018. From mugshots, to yearbooks - from Facebook’s feed to Instagram’s - the wall of faces is nothing new. The hobbled raw aesthetic here is what’s fresh. The faces fade in and out like an interconnected web. While any of these portrait formats may not have been the artists intentional reference the concept of representing the human face has evolved on the shoulders of past iterations. Johnson’s paintings blend the lines between the social and the individual.
The color in the work is top notch. They are way more complex than a bag of Skittles with color schemes that utilize a full palette. On par with how Gauguin, Cassatt or Renoir exaggerated non local colors and gave them deep saturation - Blues turn to purple or indigo and bright greens and oranges splash most faces. Johnson’s work has a similar frenzied energy to Despina Stokou’s paintings. While Stokou specifically paints texts and emojis both are painters who capture the spirit of our contemporary world.
Aaron Johnson is a clever artist and a dedicated painter who pulls no gimmicks. He’s very true to the medium. Stay tuned to SharskEatMeat for daily contemporary art, regular reviews and all your art and culture needs. Visit Joshua Liner Gallery in Manhattan and follow their Instagram for new exhibitions.
Review by John Aaron Coulter
Mu Pan: Bright Moon Shines on the River
Mu Pan’s show Bright Moon Shines on the River at Joshua Liner Gallery is one of a kind. While the concept didn’t grab me, it certainly confused me, I’m not bothered. In fact I’m very intrigued. Despite never finding a solid conclusion about the work’s theme, the sheer quality of the work allows them to stand on their own. The work’s plot is adequate as a mystery to me. A million stories can be injected in to the chaotic scenes, and the variety of interpretations gives them strength.
The paintings rival the expansiveness of any Mughal court scene or Bosch. The depth and scope of the scenes are as vast as the artist’s imagination. Never a single portrait but entire surreal and chaotic societal scenes. I’m talking Paolo Uccello’s “The Battle of San Romano” chaos. And yet they are rendered in a way so different than meaty antiquated battle scenes. The brush strokes are soft and furry with many figures left open. The lack of solidness allows easy movement through the chaotic scene; in fact it creates its own dynamic sense of movement. The smooth but dense mark-making on the figures is similar to how Klimt treated a figure’s skin.
Support Mu Pan. Visit their website and go to their shows. I highly encourage collecting these if you have the opportunity. They are ridiculous. They are the types of works you could stare at for hours and hours - longer than any Netflix binge, and still discover something new. They are excellent conversation pieces. Follow Sharks Eat Meat for more daily art and culture news.
Review by John Aaron Coulter
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