GAVIN
TREMLETT
Amusements
Private
View
Thursday December 9th
[UTF-8?]6.30pm–8.30pm
Exhibition
Dates
Friday December 10th 2010 [UTF-8?]– Saturday January 29th
2011
Gallery Hours
[UTF-8?]Wednesday–Saturday [UTF-8?]11am–6pm
or by
appointment
Address
336 Old St, London, EC1V
9DR
Contact
+44 (0)20 7739 4055
direct@charliesmithlondon.com
www.charliesmithlondon.com
“Situated between an embrace of
vulgarity in contemporary culture, and a yearning for a lost mode of figuration
in painting, my work establishes a place of intersection between the sublime
possibilities of painting, and the closed, crude nature of
[UTF-8?]pornography.”
CHARLIE SMITH london is
delighted to present Berlin based artist Gavin Tremlett with his first one
person show in London.
Tremlett’s
portraits and full figure nudes provide a point of entry into an investigation
of the human self. Playfully encouraging the gaze [UTF-8?]Tremlett’s
classically rendered adolescent subjects invite us to engage voyeuristically
whilst simultaneously turning the gaze back upon itself, as if to both absorb
and reflect; to watch and be watched; to tempt and to reject. Displaying an
emphatic sexuality, [UTF-8?]Tremlett’s subjects are at once enticing,
inquiring and accusatory. Innocent and guilty, they are both victims and
perpetrators.
Tremlett’s
unparalleled technical ability combined with the seductive come hither pose of
his subjects leads us into a confrontation with the uncanny. Beauty vies with
deformity as his classically rendered, often mask-like visages both conceal as
well as reveal. This rendering of face as mask is often coupled with abstract,
painterly marks that serve to obfuscate the subject, thus interfering with the
totality of an ideal self. There is a denial of the whole but also a doubling in
process here, both physically and symbolically. The idea of the double, which
can be read into portraits, reflections, shadows, totems or even the
continuation of a blood line, as the psychoanalyst Otto Rank would have it, is a
narcissistic extension of the self and a guarantee of immortality.
Tremlett’s
paintings then are beautiful and unsettling manifestations of numerous combined
and fragmented sources. At once we are attending art history, pornography,
popular culture, nostalgic ideals, and the [UTF-8?]artist’s and our own inner
drives and memories, both apparent and repressed.
Please contact gallery for
images and further
information.
Biographical:
Born:
1977
Education: 2001 [UTF-8?]–
2004: MA in Painting, Royal Academy Schools, London; 1996 [UTF-8?]– 1999: BA
(Hons) in Fine Art (First Class), Loughborough University School of Art &
Design
Selected Exhibitions: 2010:
Amusements (Solo), CHARLIE SMITH london, London; The Future Can Wait (curated by
Zavier Ellis & Simon Rumley), Shoreditch Town Hall, London; New British
Painting (curated by Zavier Ellis & Pilvi Kalhama), Gallery Kalhama &
Piippo, Helsinki; Papyrophilia (curated by Zavier Ellis), CHARLIE SMITH london,
London; 2008: Be Stiff (Solo), Wohnmaschine, Berlin; Prague Triennial, National
Gallery of Contemporary Art, Prague; 2007: Malkunst 2, Contemporary Painting in
Berlin, Fondazione Mudima, Milano; The Dream of Putrefaction, The Metropole
Galleries, Folkstone; 2006: The Hobby (Solo), Wohnmaschine, Berlin; Icons, Chung
King Project, Los Angeles; 2005: Introspective Men, Madder 139, London; Schmidt,
Tremlett, Tzamouranis, Wohnmaschine, Berlin; 2005: Faux Realism Part 2, The
Rockwell Project, London; Faux Realism Part 1, The Royal Academy Schools
Gallery, Hornsey; 2004: The Arrivals, The Pump House Gallery,
London
Awards & Residencies:
2004: The Gordon Luton Award for Fine Art
Painter-Stainers
Collections: Private
collections throughout Europe
