20 CM FROM THE GROUND
Antonio Ballester Moreno, José Díaz, Stevie Dix, Asger Dybvad Larsen, Secundino Hernández, Daniel Jensen, Gergely Kiss, Nicolás Lamas, Martin Lukáč, Peter Mohall, Bridget Mullen, Jana Schröder, Fabio Viscogliosi, Ian Waelder
02 December, 2017 - 16 February, 2018

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Fabio Viscogliosi, Stevie Dix, Martin Lukáč

Stevie Dix
Room, 2017
Oil, oil stick, enamel, emulsion and charcoal on canvas, 61 x 46 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč
Yellow #S, 2017
Oil and acrylic on canvas, 180 × 145 cm

 

Fabio Viscogliosi
Minor Swing, 2015
Acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21

Fabio Viscogliosi, Bridget Mullen, Martin Lukáč, 

Bridget Mullen
Notes, 2017
Acrylic paint on linen, 85 x 85 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Bridget Mullen

Jana Schröder
Spontacts GO 1, 2017
Copying pencil and oil on canvas, 200 × 160 cm

Jana Schröder
Spontacts GO 1, 2017
Copying pencil and oil on canvas, 200 × 160 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017.Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Jana Schröder, Ian Waelder, Daniel Jensen.

Ian Waelder
A few months later, 2017
Pastel oil, spray paint, marker, pen, pencil, wood, frottage of a shoe, shoelace on linen, 132 x 160 cm

Daniel Jensen
Blue Sock, 2017
oil stick and acrylic ink on linen canvas
50×40 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Ian Waelder, Daniel Jensen

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč, Asger Dybvad Larsen, Ian Waelder, Daniel Jensen.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč
Untitled, 2017
Oil and acrylic on canvas, 150 x 110 cm

Asger Dybvad Larsen
Untitled (2), 2016
Mixed Media, 71x46cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Stevie Dix
Little one, 2016
Oil, oil stick, enamel, emulsion and charcoal on canvas, 35.5 x 30.5 cm

Valérian Goalec

P.A. N°23 – 8, 2015
Oil on wood, 120 x 180 cm

Stevie Dix
Little one, 2016
Oil, oil stick, enamel, emulsion and charcoal on canvas, 35.5 x 30.5 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Fabio Viscogliosi, Ian Waelder, Daniel Jensen, Asger Dybvad Larsen, Gergely Kiss.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Daniel Jensen, Asger Dybvad Larsen, Gergely Kiss, Peter Mohall

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Asger Dybvad Larsen

Untitled (1), 2016
Mixed Media, 71x46cm

 

Gergely Kiss

Untitled(y), 2016
Emulsion, spray paint and acrylic on canvas, 80x60cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Gergely Kiss, Peter Mohall, Stevie Dix.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Peter Mohall, Stevie Dix. José Díaz in the background.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Gergely Kiss, Peter Mohall and José Díaz in the background.

Peter Mohall

Untitled (Brushstrokes Painting 1), 2017
Alkyd and acrylic on linen, oak artist’s frame, 161.2 x 121.2 cm

 

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč

Secundino Hernández
Sin título, 2016
Rabbit skin glue, chalk, calcium carbonate and titanium white on canvas, artist frame, 93 x 84 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč, Secundino Hernández, José Díaz.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Secundino Hernández, José Díaz.

José Díaz

P.O.V., 2017
Oil on linen, 192x152cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

José Díaz, Nicolás Lamas.

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

José Díaz, Nicolás Lamas, Antonio Ballester Moreno.

Nicolás Lamas

Behind the scenes, 2017
Reversed painting, 40 x 30 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Nicolás Lamas

 

Antonio Ballester Moreno

Lluvia. Noche, 2017
Acrylic on yute, 240 x 180cm

Antonio Ballester Moreno

Lluvia. Noche, 2017
Acrylic on yute, 240 x 180cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Antonio Ballester Moreno, Ian Waelder.

Ian Waelder

Shoelace laying on a ledge, 2017

Oil, shoelace, spray paint, wood and scratches on linen, 162 x 130 cm

20 cm from the ground, 2017. Installation view at L21 (l-r):

Martin Lukáč, Secundino Hernández, José Díaz, Nicolás Lamas.

The title ‘20cm from the ground’ denotes a height of a painting when installed in a painters studio, lower than a usual gallery or museum hang. More than the connotation to the process of painting, 20cm represents the transformative experience of both the painter at work and the beholder of their painting: the feeling of being lifted from the ground, becoming lost in another world, an empathetic connection.

 

Artists in the exhibition are painters in the traditional sense of working with a usually rectangular canvas or fabric onto which they apply, or erase, a pictorial, albeit abstract image. Throughout the works in the exhibition there is a preoccupation with marks, especially those that appear spontaneous, even clumsy or imperfect. While some paintings, such as Valérian Goalec’s employment of a robot to paint for him, and Antonio Ballester Moreno and Peter Mohall’s investigations into almost inhuman marks that are repetitional, most investigate a more human, fluid and freeform of painterly style.

 

Jana Schröder has described the marks she makes as ‘pure form’: the result of the arm let loose in its socket to create a gesture that seems to replicate a common doodle. This impulse to draw a natural stroke appears widespread in contemporary painting. Contrasted with the confined and considered mechanical marks, the group of painters present polar expressions that could be considered as a response to technologically mediated current affairs.

 

Despite Duchamp’s vision for a post-pictorial art, and his own abandonment of painting to focus on the power of thought, the medium has remained presiding form, critically, visually and economically. Painting now exists in post-history where content and meaning has plateaued amongst the overload of visual stimulants the modern world engages with daily.

 

For the exhibition many of the artists were ‘discovered’ through Instagram, and painting, usually a one sided medium, has found an aide in the image sharing medias. ‘20cm from the ground’ presents this plateau of painters 20cm up, scrutinising painting in the 21st century not for their technical skills but for their ability to think and reflect abstractly upon our contemporary reality. The prevalent expression from these artists relates back to the self and the act of creation, whether it was by robotic arm or their own, the individual’s mark, as an extension of their thought, mind and body, which ultimately traverses physical space.

 

Thank you to the galleries Rolando Anselmi, Björkholmen Gallery, Meessen De Clercq, The Goma, Luce, and T293 for their support.

 

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