V1 GALLERY PROUDLY PRESENTS

EMOTIONAL MANIPULATION

A SOLO EXHIBITION BY MATTHEW STONE

OPENING: FRIDAY NOVEMBER 28. 2014. TIME: 17.00 - 22.00
EXHIBITION PERIOD NOVEMBER 29 – JANUARY 10. 2015.
NOTE: The gallery will be closed for Christmas Holidays 24.12.14 – 05.01.15

Matthew Stone's new works vibrate between photography and painting, figuration and abstraction, expanding our notions of both. Rising above definitions and directly engaging the possibilities of composition. These works can not be labelled as either or, and should not be viewed as such. Works of art employing new and old artistic techniques. The 20 new beautifully expressive, seemingly abstract, digital paintings in Emotional Manipulation form part of a bold development in the technical, theoretical and aesthetic fields of the artist's practice. They represent a continuation of the works shown at Stone’s two most recent solo shows. Stone hand paints on glass and photographs the brushstrokes, which he then extensively retouches and collages using Photoshop. These digital composites are then printed onto selectively hand primed, raw linen canvas. The resulting imagery is a firm and lucid statement on the new opportunities photography and digital processing present in extending the visual and practical potential of conventional painting.

Signalling a shift in Stone’s established visual language, these new works appear to abandon his usual figuration in favour of large scale and colourful brushstrokes. The compositions relate to a sense of movement and entanglement established prior, explicating the ideas of abstraction that Stone began to define in his previous photographic explorations of the body. Whilst the brushstrokes tumble like limbs across the canvas, Stone uses advanced Photoshop layering to weave the individual gestures in ways that would not ordinarily be possible without digital intervention. The digital process remains integral to other aspects of the works; defining scale and the enlargement of brushstrokes, the removal of all dust and blemishes as well as sensitive colour management.