ALEX GARDNER, MONICA KIM GARZA, & THERESA CHROMATI
UNTITLED, MIAMI
02 Mar 2017 to 05 Mar 2017
UNTITLED, MIAMI 2017 // NEW IMAGE ART // BOOTH E24 FEATURED ARTISTS: ALEX GARDNER, MONICA KIM GARZA, & THERESA CHROMATI VIP & PRESS PREVIEW: DEC 05, 2017 // 1PM - 8PM PUBLIC HOURS: DEC 06 - DEC 09, 2017 // 11AM - 7PM, DEC 10, 2017 // 11AM -5PM UNTITLED MIAMI, 12TH ST & OCEAN DR, MIAMI BEACH FL 33139
New Image Art is pleased to be present a three-artist project featuring painters Alex Gardner, Monica Kim Garza, and Theresa Chromati for this year’s edition of UNTITLED in Miami. With a distinct appeal towards the emerging figurative painting field, New Image Art has become known as a gallery willing to take chances and extend the conventional view of figurative painting beyond previous norms. With a passion for cultivating new and under exposed artistic talent, our selection for Untitled Miami 2017 features three young figurative painters that represent New Image Art’s curatorial viewpoint and reflect a distinct perspective of contemporary art today.
Mixing concepts of race, gender, and identity, Alex Gardner’s figurative paintings have a cold, surreal feeling upon first glance. The bodies are youthfully slender, sensually sleek, and mysteriously beautiful with the omission of facial features and a gender fluidity that suggests the notion of a universal human experience. Alex’s figures play out various roles within their relationships through the portrayal of body language and gestures, demonstrating an appreciation for European Mannerism and Baroque painting. His entangled ink-black bodies are intertwined within blank architectural elements and posed in pastel environments where the reflections of color produce subtle gradients and thoughtful tonal shifts. What happens in each piece is mysterious yet familiar, which perhaps speaks to the ever-changing landscape of human relationships. Given our current turbulent socio-political climate of gender inequality and racial strife, Gardner brakes through the noise and creates a sexy cold world of mystery and intimacy.
Originating from her own image and multi-cultural background, Monica Kim Garza is intrinsically drawn to creating artwork using the female figure and the experiences of those characters. This image has evolved over the years and has come to be it's own motif. A sense of nostalgia and playful longing is often felt within the work, using memories from her personal life and travels as inspiration for narrative. Monica’s recent visit to Morocco informs her current body of work in the tradition of Matisse in Morocco or Gauguin in Tahiti, depicting local women engaging in everyday activities via the female gaze. Monica’s women have a hunger for life and unabashedly take up space; as in her previous work, the artist is not afraid to dive into the pleasures of a full figure, while she simultaneously continues to experiment within the formal practice of figurative painting. Apart from the figure, Monica’s expressive approach to color, shape and texture all play a larger role in the work demonstrating an affinity for experimentation and desire to portray women from an empowered point of view.
Theresa Chromati’s figurative paintings explore black women as opaque idealized figures that embrace the empowerment of women and various body conscious topics. Full figured women adorned with whimsical protective armor such as masks, voluptuous pussy lips, and protruding keloids help reference concepts of self-identity, ownership, body manipulation, and self-preservation against the thralls of appropriation. Theresa’s paintings emphasize subtle gestures of intimacy within familiar, romantic, and congenial relationships as well as looking into a spectrum of experiences that exist for women within public and private spaces, exceeding the limitations traditionally imposed on them. Theresa often pulls references from women she encountered during her adolescent years in Baltimore City and sheds further focus on the various nuances of communication within partnerships and black women within communities.
