Neil Gall – Paperhouse

About

Aurel Scheibler is pleased to announce Paperhouse the third solo exhibition at the gallery of the London-based artist Neil Gall. The show opens on the 16th of September   and will feature new paintings and paper collages.

Fanciful, sometimes mysterious arrangements of everyday objects, toys, Plasticine, cardboard, threads, and adhesive tape serve the artist as models – he depicts them with an uncanny accuracy in his paintings and drawings. Gall’s works open up worlds that lie between reality and imagination.

With his most recent painting series Neil Gall takes a new turn. The focus has shifted to pure colour and form. With a formal reference to both Hard Edge and Illusionism the paintings appear at first sight as large paper collages.

The paintings play with the illusion of cut-outs – the meticulously painted holes, shadows and apparent kinks perfectly imitate the materiality of paper. The flowing and filmy applied paints demonstrate a rich colour palette, which was inspired by covers of the famous art magazine The Studio from the 1940s and 1950s.

While maintaining the connection to the real world, Gall’s paintings are still abstract in their subject. They show a fascinating formal quality and beauty of craft and stay open to various interpretations. Having the gallery walls as a background, the apparent cut-outs deceive the viewer with the illusion of trompe-l’oeil. The painting is thus an object and its depiction at the same time.

Alongside the paintings, Neil Gall composed a series of collages using the original covers of The Studio. Densely layered and processed with scissors, pencil and marker, they explore a variety of forms and colour combinations.

Neil Gall was born 1967 in Aberdeen, Scotland and currently lives and works in London. His works are placed in the collections of Denver Art Museum, The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, Zabludowicz Art Trust, Aberdeen City Art Gallery, Scotland, David Roberts Arts Foundation, London, Christen Sveaas Art Collection, Oslo and other prominent international private collections.

Publications:

Neil Gall - Works 2007-2011, with an essay by Nicholas Cullinan, 2012 by Hantje Cantz

Neil Gall - Shelf Life, 2007 by Black Dog Publishing