Ben Reeves
September 17, 2011 — November 05, 2011
 |  |  |
 | ||
Ben Reeves, installation view Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, 2010 |
Saturday September 24
3:30pm Discussion between Ben Reeves and Canadian Art editor Richard Rhodes
4:00-6:00pm Reception
Presented as part of the Canadian Art Gallery Hop
Exhibition runs September 17 - November 5
Vancouver painter Ben Reeves accentuates the tangible object-ness of paint. Using images derived from the Internet or from his own photographs, Reeves dissembles imagery of crowds, falling blossoms, rain or snow into a pattern of brushstrokes that the spectator’s eye reads as a cohesive picture. Reeves’ representational works often hover on the edge of abstraction, continually asserting that the painted image is a vocabulary of brushstrokes, a culturally understood visual language. His exploration of the tension between abstraction and representation is made through a meticulous process of enlargement in which brushstrokes from earlier works are repainted - paint itself then becoming the subject matter of the work. Dominated by thick daubs of oil paint, his widely anticipated new paintings command a physical presence with their relief-like impasto surfaces. Despite the origin of these works in representational imagery, the result is a series of panels that reveal paint as a mobile and lush substance free of context. In these works swirling masses of colour declare their independent existence as pure matter.
Ben Reeves studied Fine Arts at the University of British Columbia and received his Masters in Fine Arts from Chelsea College of Art and Design, London. He currently lives in Vancouver where he teaches at Emily Carr University of Art and Design. Reeves’ work was featured in solo exhibitions at Museum London in 2006 and Oakville Galleries in 2005. His work has also been seen in numerous group exhibitions, including Take Your Time, Simon Fraser Art Gallery, Burnaby (2009); Shifting Space, Museum of Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Chongquing, China (2005); Lines Painted in Early Spring, Galerie de L’UQAM, Montreal (and tour, 2004); and For the Record: Drawing Contemporary Life, Vancouver Art Gallery (2003). Reeves’ works are in the collections of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Art Gallery of Ontario and Museum London.
Presented as part of the Canadian Art Gallery Hop
Check out the full Gallery Hop 2011 schedule of free tours and talk at galleries across Toronto at canadianart.ca/galleryhopschedule
Artists:
Ben Reeves