JOE FAN
RSA
4th – 21st November 2014
T H A C K E R AY G A L L E RY E ST. 1968
With Love from Ithaka I admired Joe Fan’s work for many years and essentially placed myself in the position of saying hello every time I met him. Over a period of time we both persuaded ourselves we knew each other and have been talking about the world and art ever since. This body of work represents a considerable evolution of style from the human form into a more transformational range of themes. His painterly narrative, redolent of Breugel, Goya and Bernini, explores themes of deconstruction of form within a metaphor of travelling that is ‘With Love from Ithaka’. Joe’s art reflects greater themes of the personal odyssey framed within the smaller compassionate scale. His pragmatic references here relate to gardens, but not gardening, where the Homeric and Hellenic tradition is played out within themes of the mundane – the fence, the cloud lantern and the organic form with the allpervading sense of the broken journey. The everyday event takes on the epic; the journey across the playground; the reflective walk and everywhere that sense that nature is encroaching and encompassing a sense of growth and belonging. The viewer should also not underestimate Joe’s sense of humour with his fracturing of scale and form and the recurring theme of the rabbit. The love of the journey to Ithaka, that is the metaphor for this exhibition, is not about the arrival but the journey that is manifest through this group of paintings. These gardens of earthly delight become real within the confluence of the practiced mark and the reflective, crepuscular grey tones.
Joe refuses to explain or interpret his art other than through the randomness of his individual mark although organic forms present in challenging degrees of perspective. The journey is a consistent theme here and Joe’s odyssey is played out within the thoroughfares of his personal journey, the playgrounds of the world and the seeking for the journey’s end. From a post-wasteland sense of despair comes a sense of hope. Shape and form coalesce into the deconstruction of space and scale with that sense of upward movement that is redolent of all Joe’s work. Joe’s simple assertion that his art should reflect a ‘truthfulness’ to self is critique enough. The work transmutes itself from that unconscious desire of feeling connected to nature to the transmutation of nature itself through the cloud-flower and the snail finger. The whole is exemplified by those recurring themes of the ascending and descending form that is indicative of the human condition of feeling constrained and the wish to break free. This is a body of work of the road less travelled. It is less to do with the narrative distance and more related to the art of being and becoming. Joe’s art sings the body electric of hope.
PA G E O N E :
Spring Time Chaos conté on hand-made paper 50x49cm (20x19ins)
Rory Lynch November 2014
Night Curtain with Floating Feather oil on canvas 91x71cm (36x28ins)
4
Poetry Reading for Beginners oil on canvas 76x107cm (30x42ins)
6
Winter Harvest oil on canvas 71x91cm (28x36ins)
8
Babel Reconstruction oil on canvas 122x153cm (48x60ins)
10
L E F T T O R I G H T:
The Faithful conté on hand-made paper 46x49cm (18x19ins)
July the 3rd from Ithaka with Love conté on hand-made paper 63x47cm (25x18ins)
Winter Tale conté on hand-made paper 46x54cm (18x22ins)
12
Night Bath oil on canvas 23x30cm (9x12ins)
14
Ghost oil on canvas 30x23cm (12x9ins)
16
Bridge above the Hidden Book of Wonder oil on canvas 91x71cm (36x28ins)
18
23 Miles to the Beach oil on canvas 101x76cm (40x30ins)
20
The Garden that I Built oil on canvas 91x71cm (36x28ins)
22
Rehearsal for a Feast contĂŠ on hand-made paper 28x51cm (11x20ins)
24
Kite oil on canvas 153x122cm (60x48ins)
26
From Ithaka with Love oil on canvas 127x102cm (50x40ins)
28
Chasing the Rain oil on canvas 71x91cm (28x36ins)
30
BIOGRAPHY
SELECTED GROUP SHOWS
Joe Fan, born in Hong Kong in 1962, came to Scotland to study Graphic Design at Aberdeen College of Commerce. He was then advised by an Aberdeen College lecturer to apply for a place at Gray’s School of Art to study Fine Art. After successfully gaining a place at Gray’s, one of his teachers was Gordon Bryce. Following graduation in 1988, Joe won the Miller Homes Young Scottish Artist of the Year, and was sent to Paris to spend time at the Cite Internationale des Arts from 1989-1990.
1985 1986
From 1990-1997, Joe returned to Aberdeen and became a Lecturer at Gray’s School of Art in Drawing and Painting. During this period, Joe also spent time as a visiting Lecturer at Cyprus College of Art, Paphos in 1994. In 1997, Joe gave up his role as a Lecturer to pursue his own full time career as an artist. Joe continues to live and work in Aberdeen
SOLO SHOWS 1989 1989 1991 1991 1994 1995/1996/1999 2000-2012 2005 2007 2011 2014
Cite Internationale des Arts, Paris Peacock Artspace, Aberdeen Compass Gallery, Glasgow Thackeray Rankin Gallery, London Royal Overseas League, London and Edinburgh Rendezvous Gallery, Aberdeen Thackeray Gallery, London Rendezvous Gallery, Aberdeen Open Eye Gallery, Edinburgh Fraser Gallery, St. Andrews Thackeray Gallery, London
Rank Xerox Marlow Art Collection, National Theatre, London Grays Sketch Club Student Exhibition, Aberdeen Art Gallery; Wood Group Young Artist Competition, Artspace, Aberdeen 1987/1988 Royal Scottish Academy Student Exhibition, Edinburgh 1988 New Generation Artists, Compass Gallery; Richard Demarco Print Exhibition, Edinburgh 1989 Grays Former Students Exhibition, Aberdeen Art Gallery 1990 Wild Boar Gallery & Restaurant, Aberdeen 1990-2012 Aberdeen Artists Society Annual Exhibition, Aberdeen Art Gallery 1991 Royal Society of Watercolourists, Annual; Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Art Annual Exhibition 1991,1992 Sue Rankin Gallery, London 1992 Aberdeen International Youth Festival, Aberdeen Art Gallery 1993 Royal Overseas Annual Exhibition, London; Ten Years of WASPS, Aberdeen Art Gallery 1993-1995 Scottish Society of Artists Annual Exhibition, Edinburgh 1993, 1995 Morrison Portrait Exhibition, R.S.A, Edinburgh 1994-2010, 2013 Royal Scottish Academy Annual Exhibition, Edinburgh 1995 Scottish Society of Artists Selected Touring Exhibition, Piers Art Centre, Orkney 1996 WASPS Studio Artists Aberdeen, Peacock Gallery, Aberdeen 1996-1998 Noble Grossart Painting Competition Exhibition, RSA, Edinburgh 1997 Festival Exhibition, Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh 1997,1998 Open Eye Gallery, Edinburgh 1998 Hunting Art Prizes Exhibition, Royal College of Art; ‘On a Grand Scale’, John Martin Gallery, London 1999 Northern Lights, Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh; Gallery 44, with Thackeray Gallery, Suffolk; ‘Connections’, RSA, Edinburgh; Noble Grossart Exhibition, RSA, Edinburgh & Glasgow School of Art
1999-2011 1999-2014 2010 2012 2014
LAF with Thackeray Gallery, London Gallery Artists, Thackeray Gallery, London Jerwood Drawing Competition Travelling Exhibition Meffan Winter Exhibition, Forfar The Lyth Arts Centre, Wick; Enclosures, Elsewhere, The Lion & Lamb Gallery, London
AWARDS 1985 1987 1988 1988 1993 1994 1995 1997 1998 2002 2003 2004 2009 2010 2010 2012 2012
Rank Xerox Selected National Competition, (1st Prize) Commonwealth Section Wood Group Young Artists Award, (1st Prize) Carnegie Travelling Scholarship (Royal Scottish Academy) Miller Home Young Scottish Artist Award Royal Overseas League National Art Competition, (1st Prize) The Guthrie Award, R.S.A The Morrison Portrait Award, (1st Prize) Portland Gallery Award, R.S.A Annual Exhibition Noble Grossart Painting Competition, (3rd Prize) Shell Expo Premier Award, Aberdeem Artists Society, (1st Prize) Elected Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy The Sir William Gillies Bequest, Royal Scottish Academy Aberdeen Artist Society Annual Exhibition, (2nd Prize) John Maxwell Travelling Scholarship, R.S.A Aberdeen Artists Society Annual Exhibition, (3rd Prize) Meffan Winter Exhibition, (1st Prize) Aberdeen Artists Society Annual Exhibition, (Commended)
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS The Scottish Arts Council Collection; Rank Xerox The Marlow Art Collection; Miller Homes Art Collection; Aberdeen Royal Infirmary; Grays School of Art; Aberdeen Art Gallery; Unilever Art Collection, (London); Jones Day (London); Soho Hotel, (London); Ham Yard, (London), and Crosby Street Hotel, (New York), as well as numerous Private Collections. The entire exhibition can be viewed on our website www.thackeraygallery.com