Allen Harrison: Beauty, Inspiration, Abstraction/Frieze Week

About

Harrison’s artistic practice is ever-evolving and has encompassed several distinct bodies of work. Harrison begins this particular process by tracing Thangka drawings on acetate, cutting up the designs, and collaging them on his canvas. Harrison’s interest in the Tibetan Thangka style is based solely on aesthetics as opposed to their traditional religious intent. Harrison honors these drawings by using the lines as partial guides throughout his painting, eventually obscuring the figures, allowing him to transcend their predetermined role or purpose. The Thangka imagery is never completely lost; it remains a swirling blueprint beneath the cloudscapes. Harrison regularly takes photographs of the sky from the roof of his studio and these images are what dictates the colors that Harrison uses as he reinterprets the sky. Allen sections the piece into smaller compositions helping him abstract from both the Thangka style and the landscape photographs. Harrison continues to layer onto his canvas building up certain areas and adding dimension.

Allen Harrison regularly photographs the sky the from the rooftop of his studio; these images are what dictate the colors of each work. A given piece is developed through a sectioning of the canvas into smaller compositions, which allows him to create new abstractions from both the Thangka style and his landscape photographs.

Allen Harrison has shown his work extensively over the past 34 years, with over 25 exhibitions throughout the United States. Most recently he has exhibited at the Portland Art Museum. Harrison is part of both private and public collections including but not limited to Architectural Digest Publishing Corporation, General Electric, 20th Century Fox, Lowes Corporation, Bank of America Corporation, the Arco Collection and Goldman-Sachs in Los Angeles. In addition, Harrison’s work is a part of the collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Byer Museum of Art. Publications include Art In America, Artnews and the Los Angeles Times. In addition to his career as a painter, Harrison has taught painting and drawing at several California colleges over the past 39 years.