Nicolas Byrne: A Catholic Episode

Vilma Gold, London E2  17/1/10  - 14/2/10

Drawing on copper and linen, Nicholas Byrne’s paintings are composed of superimpositions of febrile surfaces; built up, scraped down and layered over again. Curves, spirals and loops recur: dynamic forms, leading the gaze around the surface. Occasionally, uniform planes of colour impose themselves across the surface but don’t allow the eye to rest. Rather than providing a ground, planes of pure colour serve to obscure forms and thus agitate perception.

The work employs a diverse lexicon of art historical references, but takes particular influence from notions developed during the Rococo period concerning the motivating effect that sinuous form exerts upon the beholder’s gaze, leading it around the surface of the picture as if following a dancer. There is an erotic sense to this notion - the viewer’s pursuit of an object of desire- and in Byrne’s paintings this pursuit is sublimated into intricate plays of display and concealment.

first installation shot (left to right):

Serpentine Band, 2010
oil on copper
140 x 70 cms, 55 1/8 x 27 1/2 ins

Hosier, 2010
oil on linen
140 x 70 cms, 55 1/8 x 27 1/2 ins

Cropper, 2010
oil on linen
140 x 70 cms, 55 1/8 x 27 1/2 ins


second installation shot (left to right):

Fan, 2010
oil on copper
110 x 180 cms, 43 1/4 x 70 7/8 ins Triptych, 3 parts, each part 110 x 
60 cms, 43 1/4 x 23 5/8 ins

Barber, 2010
oil on copper
110 x 60 cms, 43 1/4 x 23 5/8 ins

 

words: Dominic Yates  photos: courtesy Vilma Gold

Born in Oldham, Nicholas Byrne lives and works in London. He studied at the Royal College of Art and had a solo exhibition at Studio Voltaire in 2008. Byrne was recently included in ‘The Dark Monarch’, Tate St.Ives (touring to Eastbourne) as well as in group shows at Mark Foxx, Los Angeles (2007) and International 3, Manchester (touring to Hatton Gallery, Newcastle upon Tyne). He will be showing at David Zwirner, New York and at the Saatchi Gallery in 2010.