Beschreibung:

Jonas Wood Fish Tank 2007 oil on canvas 180.4 x 178.2 cm (71 x 70 1/8 in.) Signed, titled and dated 'JONAS WOOD FISH TANK 2007 JBRW' on the reverse.
Provenance Anton Kern Gallery, New York Exhibited New York, Anton Kern Gallery, Jonas Wood 12 July-10 August 2007 Catalogue Essay Possessed of a calm virtuosity, Jonas Wood approaches the quotidian with an eye to beautification. He owes much to the painterly tradition of the still life: in his depictions of bathrooms, living rooms and porches, he recognises the precious quality of stasis. He imbues even the most crowded space with a delicate calm. Taking a flat, almost naïve approach to painterly form, he has earned comparisons to another painter of L.A. life – the preeminent David Hockney Fish Tank takes up a typically prosaic subject, and instils in it a quiet grandeur. Although a painter of the mundane, Wood is never tedious; against a simple sand and terracotta background, he imagines a patchwork of deeper tones. The tank is a luscious space inscribed into a sun-drenched landscape. Rendered in interlocking blocks of colour, it also reveals a Cubist inheritance; the resonance is not overbearing, but nonetheless an integral part of the work’s fabric. Wood has a deft touch, favouring the subtly pleasurable over the brash or heavy-handed. His work is historically informed but not overly weighed down by reference. The domestic animal and its habitat recur in Wood’s work. He is a painter of fish tanks as he is of bird cages. In one sense, these prove ideal forms; they suggest an interplay between restraint and magnificence which is at the heart of the painter’s work. In Fish Tank, both flora and fauna are subtle in their otherworldliness. Carefully avoiding overstatement, the artist bodies forth a vision of cool tranquility in sweltering heat. Read More