Sandro Chia
was among the foremost painters to emerge in the early 80’s. Represented by
both Leo Castelli and Sperone in New York, he was a part of the
Neo-Expressionist movement that sought to re-emphasize color and figurative
representation. His bold and lush paintings were featured in almost every major
museum exhibition benchmarking that era including Zeitgeist (Berlin) in 1982.
In an illustrious career spanning over four decades, some of his milestones
include the Biennale of Paris, San Paolo and three iterations of the Venice
Biennale.
For Sandro
it is a privilege to spend his life as a painter. His lyrical and vivid works
have captured the colorful facets of his life: a romance with the Tuscan
landscape, his bond with the history and culture of the Italian Renaissance,
his time spent in New York or the hills of Montalcino. Such paintings in a
sense cannot be painted, only lived, and Chia’s passion and personal journey is
indelible in each painting.
“On a
bright Fall day in 2015, Sandro Chia walked into the gallery. Of course, we
knew who he was and after studio visits in Tuscany and Miami, we planned for
this exhibit of new paintings. There is no better time than now to speak for his
works,” Marc Straus comments.
Each of the
new paintings presents a single heroic protagonist in a natural landscape.
Caught in mid-walk, he strikes a monumental contrapposto. Animals have become
unlikely companions – wild Horses painted deftly with tonal accents or ducks
rendered in pastel colors – with an enigmatic sense of drama, we experience the
great theatre played out in oil on canvas. The protagonist is a Wanderer, a
Time-traveler, who belongs nowhere and everywhere.
In a sole
Tondo painting filled with phantasmal faces, Chia turns Galileo’s revolutionary
telescope inward, peering introspectively. In a large bronze sculpture of a
one-winged Angel cradling his golden heart, we crave to know much more.
Wednesday March 1 2017 - Sunday April 2 2017
Marc Straus
Gallery , Lower East Side
Venue name:
Marc Straus Gallery
Address:
299 Grand St New York City 10002
Cross
street: between Allen and Eldridge Sts
Opening
hours: Wed–Sun 11am–6pm
Transport:
Subway: B, D to Grand St (Chrystie St)
Event
website: http://www.marcstraus.com
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