Robert Szot: Special Music

About

Abandoning the notion of preciousness and embracing the will to eliminate your work is the first and most difficult step in learning the language of risk that is at the core of all great art. It’s difficult because it’s counter-intuitive to upend the hard graft you’ve already put into painting. Why do anything at all if it just means destroying it in the end? That’s a fair question, of course, and the answer lies in what we are after. What’s the point? It is simply this: creating works that unfold slowly, works that tell their stories over time, art that fosters bonds and lasting relationships with whomever comes across its path. Taking risks is the only real way to reach this conclusion.

- Robert Szot

Anita Rogers Gallery is thrilled to present Special Music, a solo exhibition of paintings and works on paper by Robert Szot. The exhibition will be on view September 7 through October 15 at 494 Greenwich Street, Ground Floor in New York City. The gallery will host an opening reception with the artist on Wednesday, September 7, 6-8pm.

Special Music, Szot’s largest exhibition to date, is the culmination of his 20+ years as a working artist in New York City, and more recently, in Los Angeles as well. Szot approaches his paintings without preconceived notions or strict plans – he follows the work where it takes him, choosing to let color and composition inform him as opposed to bringing information to the work. There is a clear rigor to his methodologies, with obvious evidence of searching combined with a willingness to destabilize, utilizing risk and chaos to reach sometimes elusive conclusions. He chooses colors intuitively, ignoring traditional tenets of color theory and more academic approaches to making art – the result is work that surprises, energizes, and transcends. Compositions come together to form images both harmonious and intrinsically moving, rewarding the viewer with a story that unfolds slowly in more personal and lasting ways. Combining variety with clear authorship, the artist’s goal is one of deep story telling through communication in a visual language shared commonly among us. The works on paper follow, to a large extent, the same processes. Study of color and line, the smudged pastel, and the ink, allows a rare and intimate closeness between viewer, artist, and object. Taken together, the new body of paintings and mixed media paperworks form a major exhibition that highlights the achievements of an artist dedicated to his craft, one diligently moving forward with purpose albeit often into the unknown.

Szot (b. 1976) has exhibited his work in many galleries across the United States from New York to Los Angeles and Texas. Szot's paintings have been exhibited in the Saatchi Gallery in London and, in 2014, the artist was invited to participate in the Whitney Museum Art Party. His work is in public collections, including Credit Suisse, and numerous private collections, such as Beth DeWoody and the Bass Family. This will be the artist’s second solo exhibition with the gallery. The artist currently lives and works in both Los Angeles, CA and Brooklyn, NY. 

For further information and photographs, please contact Elizabeth Thompson at elizabeth.thompson@anitarogersgallery.com, or call 347.604.2346. The gallery is open Tuesday through Saturday 10am – 6pm.