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the macbeth

IT'S DARKEST BEFORE DAWN

Patrick Cunningham, Gary Simmonds and Robert Wilson

Fri 24 Jan - Sun 16 Feb 2003

Hoxton Distillery presents IT'S DARKEST BEFORE DAWN, a exhibition featuring three painters who share an interest in retinal imagery, but also reflect on the history of modernist painting.

Patrick Cunningham: 100 Paintings

PATRICK CUNNINGHAM'S '101' features a grid of 101 small Ultramarine or Cobalt Blue paintings. To establish the position of each individual painting, the artist tossed a coin 101 times.

Result: 48 Cobalt Blue paintings (heads)
53 Ultramarine Blue paintings (tails)

Continued to infinity this process would result in an equal number of each colour; a mathematical certainty that frames the work-a random sample.

Gary Simmonds: Butterfly Kiss & Snowing in Paris

Gary Simmonds: Touchie Feelie

GARY SIMMONDS uses an ornamental grid to create large vibrant paintings that appear, on first encounter, to be solely concerned with aspects of colour in a classic 50's way. Certainly, there is a parallel with the mass production hues of that period. Come closer and see that the charming wallpaper stars are made by smearing paint rather than by using a brush; the factory colours somehow tawdry and fatigued. The most recent pieces use a dark or back ground, forming a dense kaleidoscope - both claustrophobic and nostalgic.

Robert Wilson: New paintings for Hoxton Distillery

ROBERT WILSON'S paintings are derived from partially developed polaroids. They are intented to exact some physical/optical effort from the viewer; to be antagonistic, but ultimately rewarding. Images slowly reveal themselves, like exiting the cinema into bright daylight.

IT'S DARKEST BEFORE DAWN has been organised by John Hanson and Richard Paul.

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