This spring Pontone Gallery exhibits at the prestigious Expo Chicago art fair. The gallery showcases a selection of its international artists, who range across the fields of painting, photography and sculpture. Common to all is a deep immersion in and mastery of their chosen practice. These artists are concerned with making pieces that seduce and intrigue the eye. They deploy a profound and mature understanding of process to fully express their ideas.
Matteo Massagrande is a critically acclaimed Italian painter. He creates images of atmospheric architectural vistas and emotionally significant landscapes. Steeped in the classical tradition, he brings a great depth of art historical reference to his work. Second to none in his skilful use of representational technique, his pictures conjure up complex and compelling illusions of haunting spaces.
Korean sculptor, Hwang Seontae, makes lightboxes. Constructed from etched glass and concealed LED lighting, these are meticulously crafted images of still contemplation. We are shown crisply delineated and subtly illuminated scenes of domestic interiors. They have the quality of stage sets, ready for action, anticipating human presence.
Emma Stone-Johnston is a young, English, abstract painter. Her vibrant paintings are intricate combinations of graphic marks and clots of paint, glistening slicks and misty washes of pastel-hued and jewel-like colour. These formal elements come in and out of focus across the picture plane, emphasising the ebbs and flows of her dynamic compositions.
Lee Jeonglok is a Korean artist who works with photography to make beautiful images of mystical events in elemental landscapes. An expert in the manipulation of his medium, he uses sophisticated time-lapse techniques and long exposures to stage dramatic and haunting interventions. In these new pieces this action takes place in the wild and sublime topography of Iceland.
Englishman Chris Rivers makes powerfully gestural oil paintings in a contemporary, Romantic idiom. His subjects range from the churning voids of outer space to lush and sumptuous flower still lifes. His flamboyant and expressive handling draws the viewer into an exciting world of turbulent expression.
Throughout April Pontone Gallery will be running a parallel exhibition featuring these artists at its new London space in Fitzrovia, minutes from Mayfair and the West End.
