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Richard Stone & Lorena García Mateu
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Richard Stone
Stone is a London-based artist who received his MA from Central Saint Martins. His sculptural forms capture the liminal space between solidity and movement, emergence and dissolution, figuration and abstraction whilst articulating the continued relevance of beauty in classical materials. These unique works boldly respond to the histories that came before him whilst offering a contemporary reimagining. Stone was included in the museum exhibition Nature Morte, curated by Michael Petry, The Guildhall Gallery, London (2017), having previously toured Norway, 2015, Sweden, 2016 and Belgium, 2017. Stone’s solo shows include everywhen, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London (2017); in the shape of centuries, James Freeman Gallery, London (2015); gleam, Kristin Hjellegjerde, London (2014). He has also shown at Art Dubai (2019), Art Brussels (2018) and Volta Basel (2016, 2017) and London Art Fair (2016) with Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery. Recent group exhibitions and commissions include A splendour among shadows (with Lorena García Mateu) at Kristin Hjellegjerde, London (2020); All the days and nights at Kristin Hjellegjerde, London (2020); Skulpturegarten, Galeria Brunnhofer, Linz, Austria (2018); Kunstsalon Perchtoldsdorf, Burg Perchtoldsdorf, Austria (2018); Sweep~ Landskip, Kinokino, Sandnes, Norway. Curated by Roberto Ekholm (2018); Royal Society of Sculptors Summer Exhibition, Dora House, London. Curated by Jo Baring, Director of the Ingram Collection (2018); Art Brussels, with Kristin Hjellegjerde, Brussels, Belgium (2018); Imago Mundi, Triestre, Salone degli Incanti, Italy (2018); Ruins (with Saad Qureshi) at Kristin Hjellegjerde, London (2013); and Old Master Dialogues at Collyer Bristow, London (commission, 2013).
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Lorena García Mateu
Lorena García Mateu (b. 1983) lives and works in Valencia, Spain. She graduated in 2008 in Fine Art MA in Art Production from the Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain. Lorena’s interests encompass figurative art and nature interpretation, often referring to Art History. Throughout her work — which embraces mainly oil painting — the artist explores the search of colour and its harmony, claiming to arouse atmospheres charged by mystery, movement and uncertainty. García Mateu has participated extensively in solo and group exhibitions across Spain and internationally. Solo shows include: Life is the mistery, Artifact Gallery, New York (2020); La vida silenciosa, Galería Movart, Madrid (2018); Ahora Nosotras II, MARCA, León (2015); Onírica, ArtClub, Caro Hotel, Valencia (2014); Life in Motion, Las Naves Centro de Creación Contemporánea, Valencia (2013); Origen, L’Espai, Delegación de Cultura, Torrent (2013); Il Corpo Evocato, Studio Arte Fuori Centro, Roma (2008); Il Corpo Evocato, Accademia di Belle Arti, Maceratta (2007). Group shows include the upcoming duo show with Richard Stone at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London (2020); Arte Aparte XII, Sala La Carolina, Jaén, Spain (2020); Festival de les Arts. Ciutat Vella Oberta, Octubre Centro Cultura Contemporánea, Valencia (2018); Nuevos Nómadas IV, Sala Exposiciones PTS, Granada (2018); Nuevos Nómadas II, Real Alcázar de Sevilla, Sevilla (2018); Nuevos Nómadas I, Museo de Almería, Almería (2016); Festival de les Arts Ciutat Vella Oberta, Casa de Velázquez, Madrid (2016); Poli_zontes. Paisaje contemporáneo, MARCA, León (2016); Project IMAGO MUNDI, MADE IN SPAIN, Fundación Benetton and CAC, Málaga (2016).
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Enquire
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Lorena García Mateu, Contact, 2019
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Lorena García Mateu, Fall, 2019
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Lorena García Mateu, The Celebration, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The Dance, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The element, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The embrace, 2019
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Lorena García Mateu, The Fortune, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The Game, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The Hidden, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The insight, 2019
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Lorena García Mateu, The opportunity, 2020
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Lorena García Mateu, The thinker, 2019
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Richard Stone, born soon unto the sky , 2020
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Richard Stone, the last of the heroes to fall , 2020
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Richard Stone, a knight unto horses, 2020
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Richard Stone, all shadows come to the shore , 2020
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Richard Stone, i dreamt i was a horse in the form of a bird (after Frink) , 2020
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Richard Stone, a splendour among shadows, 2020
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Richard Stone, daydreamer, 2020
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Richard Stone, visions of ariel, 2020
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A Splendour Amoung Shadows
Statuesque horses appear half hidden in thick swathes of colourful fabric while canvases of painted hands reach through backgrounds of vibrant flora. Bringing together the sculptural work of London-based artist Richard Stone and Spanish artist Lorena García Mateu’s paintings, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery presents A Splendour Among Shadows, a timely exploration of sensuality and artistic representation.
The exhibition’s title, borrowed from Percy Bysshe Shelley’s sonnet Lift not the painted veil…, makes reference to the romanticism of both artists' work and their intertextual inspirations as well as the more abstract concept of life emerging from darkness. For both artists here, splendour is tied up with materiality and perspective. ‘I really think there is a sensuality to the world that we live in, but that we have moved incredibly far from it,’ comments Stone. ‘Materiality through sculpture has become a medium for me to reconnect with that sensuality. There is a conscious countering with my approach to fluidity and movement that resists what we often create for ourselves through the flatness of our phone screens. As much as these screens open space out and connect us, they also simultaneously close it and isolate us.’ -
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As such, Stone’s works are highly expressive, employing dualities - such as movement and stillness, surrender and resistance, tradition and modernity - to create a palpable sense of tension and dynamism. This is perhaps most keenly expressed in only from the ruins will you be free, the next evolution of the artist’s ongoing marble flag series. Through material transformation and the appearance of time suspended, Stone transcends the nationalistic associations of a flag, allowing us to contemplate the object anew. Similarly, the artist disrupts the traditional symbolism of a horse. In contrast to historic representations of heroism and masculinity, Stone’s brass and porcelain horses are softened and partially concealed by abstracted fabric rendered from clay. The illusion of movement combined with a careful use of colour creates narrative intrigue and a haunting sense of fragility that also reveals the artist’s critical engagement with his medium. ‘Historically, sculpture attempted to enshrine heroic icons of power and conquest in permanence. Yet, as history has shown, that which is believed permanent, becomes questionable or eventually falls into ruin,’ says Stone.
García Mateu similarly interrogates the medium of oil painting through direct engagement with other paintings drawn from art history. Each work features specific hand gestures, which have been taken from a classical painting and transported into a new, surreal context. Emerging from vibrant, luscious backgrounds, the isolated gestures gain a new kind of physicality and significance. ‘It’s very important for me to show the mystery and the hidden versus the visible. The static hands are in a background where the organic and the dynamic live together with abstract vegetation,’ explains the artist who developed this unique -
approach after seeing George de La Tour’s 1595 painting El tramposo de los diamantes. ‘I began to notice that there is always a picture inside a picture,’ says García Mateu. ‘I asked myself what would happen if I dispensed with everything in the image except hands. Would it reveal some specific meaning?’ Whilst the viewer is first drawn to the facial expressions of a group of card players in the George de La Tour artwork, The Opportunity by García Mateu refocuses our gaze on a single pair of hands which appear almost plant-like as they rise up on a vivid red stem against a sensuous background of blue leaves. Here, as in all of her works, the absence of the body makes space for a language of colour, gesture and emotion.
In some paintings, García Mateu provides visual clues, such as arms and glimpses of clothing. The Hidden (inspired by Johaan Friedrich Overbeck’s Italy and German (Sulamita and Maria)), for example, depicts a moment of intimacy or perhaps, condolence as one person’s hands clasps another hand into their lap. The atmosphere of sensuality and warmth is further emphasised through the soft, curved lines of leaves and the harmonious balance of colours. In this way, ‘the interpretation of the works is focused toward a more poetic, mysterious and spiritual sense,’ says García Mateu, registering another commonality between her and Stone’s practices as both artists reach towards transcendence.
Through their complex and rich materialities both these sculptural and painted artworks, invite the viewer to engage in a deeply felt sense of the world that celebrates movement, individuality, texture, ambiguity and romance.
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Richard Stone & Lorena García Mateu
Past viewing_room