About this Event
Hamlet: Do you see yonder cloud
that’s almost in shape of a camel?
Polonius: By the mass, and ‘tis like
a camel indeed.
Hamlet: Methinks it is like a weasel.
Polonius: It is backed like a weasel.
Hamlet: Or a whale?
Polonius: Very like a whale.
From Piet Mondrian’s homogenisation of pictorial space, to Jonathan Lasker’s impasto lattices, and Heimo Zobernig leaving his masking tape attached, the modernist grid is synonymous with an assertion of painting as a literal object, over and above its facility for illusion. Yet here, Parlour reimagines the grid as a site for illusion. For Yonder Cloud, her grids are patterns of relation but they can also be read as codified representations of multiple paintings in a salon hang. While an abstract painting commenting on the pragmatics of its display is familiar territory for abstraction (e.g., Robert Ryman), in her Salon Paintings Parlour uses abstraction to re-present representation as such. Or, as a certain surrealist might have put it: this is not a salon hang.
With her playful reworking of historical parameters Parlour underscores the disparity between what we see and what we interpret. Meaning lies with what the viewer bestows – this succinctly illustrated by Parlour’s reflexive approach to painting, as it is with Shakespeare’s ‘yonder cloud’ exchange.
About:
Selma Parlour has created a unique visual vocabulary comprising diagrammatic space, framing, trompe l'oeil illusion, haptic surfaces, transparency, repetition, and of course, colour, Selma Parlour is known for her meticulous oil paintings that appear as though they are drawn, dyed, or printed.
Born in Johannesburg (1976) Parlour received her PhD in Art from Goldsmiths, University of London. Awards include an Arts Council England Creative Development Award (2020); the Mark Rothko Memorial Trust Artist-in-Residence Award (2018); the Sunny Dupree Family Award for a Woman Artist, the Summer Exhibition, the Royal Academy of Arts, London (2017); and John Moores Painting Prize (prizewinner, 2016).
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Pi Artworks London, 55 Eastcastle Street, London, United Kingdom
GBP 0.00