MARCH 5 – 28, 2015 | Peter Fox : Telemetry
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Scott Richards Contemporary Art presents TELEMETRY a new series of textural abstract paintings by PETER FOX. An opening cocktail reception for the artist will take place on Thursday, March 5, 5:30-7:30 pm. The exhibition continues through March 28.
At first glance, the heavily textured surfaces of Peter Fox’s paintings take on the appearance of something beyond paint. Variously compared to glazed porcelain, marbled paper, cake frosting, or even flattened rubber balloons, they speak to us on an evocative visual level.
The paint is applied with a custom-made applicator that dispenses small quantities of mixed colors onto an inclined canvas, allowing gravity to cause the paint to slide in multiple controlled drips. Despite the methodical technique, accidental variation is encouraged, and plays a central role in the outcome. The resulting rythmic color compositions are mesmerizing. In a review in Hyperallergic (July, 2012), Brendan S. Carroll wrote, “From afar, the droplets form a shimmering field of light and color. On closer inspection, each buttery droplet feels like a universe unto itself.”
Fox is obsessed with language, both the language of words and the language of color. The artist is known for his text paintings, consisting of partially hidden, disembodied words embedded in fields of color (he recently created a monumental-scale billboard using the words GO HOME, which was displayed at the Museu de Arte Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil). In his current series, the text is translated into pure abstraction: the language of words has been disassembled and reconstructed into an alternate language of of interrelated colors.
As illustrated by the series titled Disruptive Theologies, in which thick ropes of paint ropes of paint engulf the surface of photos printed on canvas, Fox’s new paintings aim to “subvert the pixelated order of reality.” In the artist’s words, the paintings incorporate “aspects of figuration, surrealism, optical and psychedelic art, while staying firmly located in process-based abstraction. The tension between what it seems to be and what it seems to suggest is a primary emotive driver of the work; a developed Rorschach test, of sorts.”
Peter Fox earned an MFA degree from Tyler School of Art, studying in Philadelphia and Rome. Since then, he has shown extensively throughout the United States and received many positive critical reviews. He lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. This is Fox’s inaugural solo exhibition with Scott Richards Contemporary Art.