CAPRICE
Ian Mackay

October 02 to 26, 2019
Nuit Blanche Opening Preview Reception: Saturday, October 5, 2 to 5 PM
Evening Reception: Thursday, October 10, 6 to 8 PM

The Red Head Gallery is pleased to present CAPRICE, an exhibition of new work by Ian Mackay. The show will open on October 2 and remain on view through October 26, 2019. An opening preview will be held on Saturday, October 5, from 2 PM until 5 PM, and a reception will be held on Thursday October 10, from 6 PM to 8 PM.

Drawing on the legacies of both figurative and abstract painting, Mackay presents a series of works depicting subjects and scenarios that resonate with larger issues in our current political and cultural landscape. Caprice means a sudden, unpredictable change, a whimsy, without apparent or adequate motive. It aptly describes the daily unreason, the falling apart of our current social, political, and spiritual order. It also describes the artist's approach to art-making for this exhibition. Exploratory and provisional, these works combine humour, accident, automatic drawing, and expressionistic colour, to vivify anxious states of mind or soul that should surprise no one these days.

Influenced by early 20th century Expressionist artist groups, Die Brucke and Der Blaue Reiter, this exhibition features some of Mackay’s large semi-abstract pastel works and smaller “portrait” oil paintings of figures in crisis. In the Zoomorphic Redaction series, Mackay places vertical stacks of colour reminiscent of his earlier block paintings, on top of gesticulating organic forms suggesting that animal morphology is being overlaid by the human-made. The anonymous figures in the portrait paintings are caught in some kind of struggle with the present conditions of life on a faltering planet. Mackay’s use of vivid colour and emotional tension intensify the experience of the viewer.

Ian Mackay is a Canadian artist living in Toronto where he maintains his studio. He completed his AOCA at Ontario College of Art in 1980 with studies in Photo-Electric Arts. In 2009 he completed a BFA at OCAD in Curatorial Studies and Integrated Media. Since 2009 Ian has concentrated exclusively on his painting practice and his work can be found in private collections.

For more information visit: imackay.ca
@ianmackayartist |@ianlmackay|#IanMackay