Collapsing

May 14 - June 1, 2013

Ben Webb
 
 
 
Study V 11  Study 6 II 10  Study VI 11

Jonathan Smart Gallery is pleased to present Ben Webb's fourth solo project with the Gallery. Self-titled, the exhibition is called Collapsing, and comprises works on paper from the last two years in the main, but also includes some work almost a decade old.

Study 29 IV 13   Study 13   Study 08

Webb has found images, had these commercially printed onto rag paper, then worked over them, pouring inks, solvents and metallic pigments energetically and by hand. Sometimes the touch is light, a graceful line or wash floating with haunting luminosity above the image. At other times though, Webb's intervention is heavier and much more physical. Subjects are eroded by solvents, bitumen and an orbital sander. Webb's work on paper becomes work in paper. And surfaces betray a forensic history as long and fraught as his cast of characters so obviously exude.

Study 14 III 13  Study 14 II 13  Study (untitled)  Study 1 V 10

Webb's gallery of heads includes glamorous women, but is dominated by men of dubious lineage - at times beautiful but also detached, disturbed and edgy. Central to a bank of new work however, is the poem Schizophrenic Highway, by Dunedin writer Peter Olds. Webb has printed it large, the same size as an image of a masked nurse administering a needle to a patient - visual company to the Olds text, a diptych in his eyes. Olds' passionate love poem is full of weight and loss, its dissolute beauty thoroughly in keeping with Webb's image alongside.

diptych_Schizophrenic Highway_6 IV 13
 
 

Additional Works

Study X 12  Study XI 12  Study 12 XII 01

 

List of works

Study 21 IV 13,  820 x 630mm
Study 20 VIII 09 (diptych),  1020 x 1470mm
Study IV 12,  600 x 420mm
Study II 10,  670 x 500mm
Study 11,  510 x 340mm
Study XII 12,  720 x 530mm
Study VI 11,  820 x 640mm
Study V 11,  900 x 660mm
Study X 12,  640 x 470mm
Study 12 XII 01,  560 x 380mm
Study 29 IV 13,  650 x 840mm
Study XI 12,  650 x 500mm
Study 6 II 10,  1020 x 750mm
Study 17 IX 09,  970 x 720mm
Study 14 III 13,  980 x 730mm
Study X 09, 940 x 700mm
Study 2 II 07,  900 x 700mm
Study 13,  970 x 750mm
Study (untitled),  1000 x 700mm
Study 14 II 13,  840 x 570mm
Study 08,  920 x 670mm
Study 1 VI 10,  1000 x 700mm
Study 6 IV 13 & Schizophrenic Highway (diptych),  1070 x 1560mm

All works are comprised of a variety of oil, ink and metallic / opalescent pigments on etching paper, unframed.