ANDY PIEDILATO
ANDY PIEDILATO Recent Paintings September 9 - October 8, 2016
D A N E S E C O R E Y 5 1 1 W 2 2 S T NY NY 1 0 0 1 1 2 1 2. 2 2 3 .2 2 2 7 . D A NES EC OR EY . C OM
There is something ridiculous and miserly in the myth we inherit from abstract art: That painting is autonomous, pure and for itself, and therefore we habitually analyze its ingredients and define its limits. But painting is ‘impure’. It is the adjustment of ‘impurities,’ which forces painting’s continuity. We are image-makers and image-ridden. There are no ‘wiggly or straight lines’ or any other elements. You work until you vanish. The picture isn’t finished if they are seen. –Philip Guston
ANDY PIEDILATO Body of Water by Dulce Shultz Andy Piedilato didn’t set out to paint shipwrecks or glaciers, his formal training began in medical illustration, and while the subject matter of his work has changed dramatically, something of the scientific method remains in his paintings, systematically breaking down an elaborate unknown. Like all investigations, his begins with a question, and if such thoughts could be given words they might be , “how do I make something different from what I’ve made before?” Piedilato’s early works were essentially abstract, concerning forms that resembled hills, wheels, and rolling tectonic plates colliding and slipping past one another in indeterminate space. These compositions were born of an initial gesture, applied directly to the canvas by hand, becoming more chaotic and complex as they progressed. The problem with working this way is that procedural memory guides us back to motions we’re adept at performing, and eventually, marks intended to be random will start to follow a pattern. How does one fight this tendency? Piedilato’s answer was to return to figuration as a means of tackling formal issues, just as Willem de Kooning did in the 60s or Carroll Dunham did in the 80s. The paintings in this exhibition begin with persistently modified sketches that provide critical space from the organic, reactionary choices on which earlier works were founded. Meanwhile, the artist has allowed himself to play up the recognizable forms emerging from the picture plane, suggesting a newfound willingness to incorporate human narrative. A ship’s mast reads as bone, rope as tendon, and the sea as flesh. Permitting the laws of nature to dictate light, shadow and depth resulted in compositions that are at once more refined and more unusual – a prime example, if ever
there was one, that truth is stranger than fiction. It is fitting that these seascapes should inspire awe and make us feel small. The scale of these works is impressive, yet we regularly encounter architectural features of a similar size that don’t impose themselves in quite the same way. Rather, their impact lies in the sense that the artist has worked furiously to capture every detail of a rapidly unfolding drama with no time to address the occasional splatter. In the midst of sudden trauma, like a free fall, our brains record minutia more acutely and experience a dilation of time. There is beauty and serenity in these moments that is closer to the mood these paintings evoke than the feeling of terror or confusion one might expect. The dynamic subject matter of this work belies a slow, painstaking masking process Piedilato uses to create a rich, multilayered surface that gives and takes. Even at a distance the eye discerns subtle differences in depth as marks build upon and efface what has come before. At close range the work achieves a sculptural quality. Slick, frothy white, not yet dry before let loose of its confines, spills over dusty hues of sage and slate that look to have been stamped in with a dry brush. A Cartesian plane laid bare by this net of masking tape underpinnings traces the undulating surfaces of waves and hull. Like Mark Bradford’s use of graphic information to map time and place, Piedilato employs a geometry that obfuscates meaning even as it seems to describe the workings of a complex system. Here we have neither sense of scale nor geographic reference to reveal the gravity of damage or the distance from shore.
Pinched Red Sail, 2016, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 100 x 117 in.
Endurance, 2016, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 96 x 113.5 in.
Ice Spine, 2015, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 102 x 126 in.
Wake, 2015, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 96 x 109.5 in.
Pillars, 2014, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 108 x 126.5 in.
Sea Snail, 2013, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 111 x 121 in.
Low Tide, 2012, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 108 x 120 in.
Scroll Waves, 2011, alkyd and acrylic on canvas, 108 x 120 in.
Studio view, 2016, photograph by Brian Buckley
BIOGRAPHY 1974 Born in Athens GA Currently lives and works in Bushwick, NY EDUCATION 1997 BFA, Painting, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 2002 MFA, Painting, from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY AWARDS/FELLOWSHIPS/GRANTS 2015 Rosenthal Family Foundation Award in Painting, honoring “a young American painter of distinction” 2006 nominated for the Lambent Fellowship 2005 George Segal Grant for painting SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2016 Danese/Corey, New York, NY 2013 Patrick Painter, Inc., Santa Monica, CA 2011 Patrick Painter, Inc., Santa Monica, CA English Kills Gallery, Brooklyn NY 2010 English Kills Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2009 English Kills Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2005 Black and White Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2002 Black and White Gallery, Brooklyn, NY GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2015 Land + Sea, Danese/Corey, New York, NY Exhibition of Work by Newly Elected Members and Recipients of Honors and Awards, The American Academy of Arts And Letters, New York, NY Invitational Exhibition of Visual Arts, The American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY 2014 ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT: Selections from the Frederick R Weisman Art Foundation, Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA 2013 Gallery Show of New Artists, Patrick Painter, Inc. Santa Monica, CA 2012 Peekskill Project V, Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY 2010 NEW MIRRORS: Painting in a Transparent World, Exit Art, New York, NY 2007 Sheltering Sky, Black and White Gallery, New York, NY 2006 Mirror of our Obsessions and Fears, Black and White Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Published in conjunction with the exhibition: Andy Piedilato: Recent Paintings Danese/Corey, New York, NY September 9 - October 8, 2016 Photography: Brian Buckley Cover: Pillars, 2014 (detail) Catalogue © 2016 Danese/Corey Essay © 2016 Dulce Shultz Works of art © 2011-16 Andy Piedilato
D A N E S E C O R E Y DANESE GALLERY LLC 511 W 22ND ST NEW YORK, NY 10011 T 212.223.2227 www.DANESECOREY.COM
D A N E S E C O R E Y