Condensations
Gary Evans
new paintings
April 5 - May 11, 2024
Opening Reception Saturday April 6, 7 - 10pm
The paintings in Condensations are the result of translating impressions and experiences in nature (looking, being with, and travelling through) to the surface of a painting, a flat space, and a sort of negotiated terrain with many factors affecting the outcome.
These images are intuitive and imaginative landscapes. They all hold a record of their evolution, made and remade till they settle into an image that makes sense subjectively.
For Evans, painting is a process where material, memory, process, history, conscious and unconscious decision making, all define outcome with the final image a space of convergence of these influences.
The paintings are perhaps as much about the age-old phenomenon of trying to capture the constant movement and growth that surrounds us, by concretizing it in two dimensions, as the works are reconstituting and processing, in the making, to express an inner state.
As Joan Mitchell says, “I’m more likely to carry my landscapes around with me.” This is accurate to Evans' personal experience. The natural textures, the light and colour, are all constant sources of inspiration and manipulating them, considering the possibilities, is an ongoing process of discovery.
Evans says, "The outcome of the process of observing, remembering, and recreating intrigues me. It is in constant translation, from image to thought, and hand to media, to create a final work."
"The look of the work I realize is pastoral. It feels like I am creating a personal refuge at times, a malleable imaginary space, one of re-enchantment, a condensation of material and thought. It becomes a way to express the mystery inherent in the natural world that is elusive when actually faced with it. I hope that people are able to spend time to discover some mediative potential or their own geographies inside them."
Gary Evans was born in Weston Super Mare, England and resides in Alliston, Ontario. His painting challenges traditional notions of perception and experience of the Canadian landscape. Of his more than twenty solo exhibitions highlights include a touring survey exhibition of his work, "Seeing Things: The Paintings of Gary Evans", curated by Stuart Reid, with catalogue, which toured Canada between 2000-2002 as well as a survey of paintings, "Station", curated by James Patten at The Art Gallery Of Windsor in 2008 and a fifteen-year survey, "Farther Afield", curated by Renée van der Avoird at the MacLaren Art Centre, Barrie, ON, in 2016. Evans is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design (grad. 1989) and is the past Coordinator of the School of Design And Visual Art, Georgian College, Barrie, ON. Evans has been exhibiting at PPCA since 1995.