Grear Patterson: True Romance

About

Patterson’s mixed media works present stylised sunsets, alongside auditory and visual recreations of the Tony Scott directed picture. The exhibition explores pop-culture, imagery and processes of perception, recurrent motifs of the artist’s output.

Inspired by the visual vernacular of a sunset as an auspicious moment - simultaneously a romanticised ending and yet a promise of new beginnings – the exhibition explores the artist’s interest in celebrations of naiveté, as portrayed within films of this era. Large-scale sunsets created from a variety of found material – including parachutes, boat sails, wedding tablecloths and vinyl – and smaller-scale block colour paper works in purples, pinks, blues, oranges and greens, become a memorialisation of youthful possibility, odyssey and adventure.

The idealised tropical aesthetic – a popular visual motif, particularly within today’s social media-driven landscape – extends to the gallery itself; banana trees and hammocks – signifiers of a beach scene – will inhabit the space. The gallery’s largest wall will be dedicated to a site-specific sunset rendered in coloured vinyl; the pieces position the gallery as its own sunset scene, whilst providing a location to absorb and interact with the work on display.

A former member of The Still House Group, Grear Patterson was born in 1988 in Redding, Connecticut; USA. He studied at Duke University and the School of Visual Arts in New York.