Karin Davie: It's a Wavy Wavy World

KARIN DAVIE

IT’S A WAVY WAVY WORLD

KARIN DAVIE IT’S A WAVY WAVY WORLD September 10 - October 30, 2021

KARIN DAVIE IT’S A WAVY WAVY WORLD NEW YORK, NY, CHART is pleased to present Karin Davie — It’s a Wavy Wavy World, from September 10 - October 30, 2021. This is the artist’s first show in New York since 2007, and will be presented on both floors of the gallery. It includes nine new paintings and five large-scale works on paper that were conceived a decade earlier. The juxtaposition of both series of work and mediums embodies the continued formal preoccupations and metaphoric connections consistently present in Davie’s work.

It’s a Wavy Wavy World references both the exterior world, the artist’s own interior world and the interface of the two. In Davie’s paintings, the wave is a metaphor for a disturbance or turbulence but also renewal. Waves move as nothing stays constant. In Davie’s 2006 mid-career survey at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, museum director Louis Grachos writes, her work “explores the boundaries between representation and abstraction while simultaneously alluding to the figure, memory, and landscape. There is a myriad of ways to contemplate the evolution of her style, as her paintings reach beyond an isolated visual experience, embodying emotion, movement, social commentary, and most importantly the artist’s hand.”

The large life scaled works in the exhibition deviate from the traditional square or rectangular painting format as the edges have been altered using the shapes of different body parts. An enlarged thumb shaped indent or protrusion interrupts the border of the larger paintings. Wavy sides and bottom edges are informed by the elbow and knee. Some of the smaller paintings are diptychs, a formal device Davie has used in earlier work. These configurations add a sculptural feature that separate from pictorial convention. Optical gradations of intense blues, reds and purples create a mysterious light and space, forming pulsating portals, cell-like fields, or abstracted body forms. There is a deep physicality involved with constructing each brushstroke, repetitiously and directly applying wet into wet paint.

Davie writes of her most recent work, “In a sense, concepts of 60s edge painting, Minimalism and Process Art have been humorously re-imagined. The iconic architecture of the ‘square within a square’ motif and suggestion of a metaphysical light at the end of the tunnel is transformed into a Pop infused personal image that is both optical and visceral, figurative, and landscape-conjuring irrepressible energies, anthropomorphic identities, and metabolic processes. It is a ‘wavy’ image, a recurring theme in my work and a metaphor for human emotions and life’s challenges­—an obsession of mine.”

1

In the Metabolic no 2, 2019, oil on linen over shaped stretcher, 72 x 72 x 1 1/2 inches (182.8 x 182.8 x 3.8 cm)

In the Metabolic no 3, 2019, oil on linen over shaped stretcher, 75 3/4 x 72 x 1 1/2 inches (192.4 x 182.8 x 3.8 cm)

3

While My Painting Gently Weeps no 2, 2019, oil on linen over shap

ped stretcher, 74 1/2 x 84 inches (189.2 x 213.4 cm)

5

Karin Davie’s Studio, Seattle, WA

7

While My Painting Gently Weeps no 4, 2019, oil on linen over shape

ed stretcher, 74 1/2 x 108 inches (189.2 x 274.3 cm)

9

In the Metabolic no 5, 2019, oil on linen over shaped stretcher, 60 x 60 inches (152.4 x 152.4 cm)

In the Metabolic no 8, 2020, oil on canvas over shaped stretcher, 60 x 60 inches (152.4 x 152.4 cm)

11

Shape of a Fever no 1, 2019, oil on canvas over wood, 30 x 21 inches (76.2 x 53.3 cm) (panels 30 x 10.5 inches)

Down My Spine no 1, 2019, oil on canvas over wood, 30 x 20 inches (76.2 x 52.1 cm) (panels 30 x 10.5 inches)

13

Side Effects no 6, 2018, oil on canvas over wood, 20 x 32 inches (40.6 x 60.9 cm) (panels 16 x 20 inches)

Side Effects no 3, 2018, oil on canvas over wood, 20 x 32 inches (50.8 x 81.3 cm) (panels 20 x 16 inches)

15

Karin Davie’s Studio, Seattle, WA

artist exhibition statement One of the things that was very important to me in developing this new body of work, is that I allowed myself the freedom and time to experiment freely with new forms, imagery and materials. I’m a doodle maniac, always doodling, so I decided that that was a good place to start. I had filled up over 10 books very quickly at this time, and this led to a desire to make larger scaled drawings. At first, I didn’t really know where I was going to start or exactly where it would lead, but the not knowing, actually felt very freeing. In the past, I think a moment like this might have felt a bit terrifying and daunting, but it actually felt quite liberating and exciting.

After doing hundreds of doodles, I focused in on one simple idea - I wanted to make wavy marks around the edge of a square, something I had embarked upon in the early 90’s. Those drawings were titled Four Sides. They were drawings made by taping off a square in the middle of a rectangular piece of white paper and painting irregular waves around the inside edge of the square using black gouache. Looking at all the doodles and thinking back to those earlier images, gave me a clue for how to begin. After doing several drawings that were similar to those earlier ones, but different, something interesting started to appear. But I quickly realized that I wanted to use color, and that the square felt familiar and predictable – but that was something I thought I could exploit. For me, it symbolized a kind of Modernist ideal of perfection and stability, something that I instinctually wanted to subvert. I needed to find a way to disrupt the shape somehow, create a perversion.

As I was observing myself making these gestural marks on paper, I noticed my left hand touching the bottom of the square paper. I really liked seeing my finger become a part of the image. I decided to try tracing around my thumb to get the shape, as if it was pushing right up into the image. I cut the shape out at the bottom edge. Then I painted the wavy marks around it, as if they were being pushed up and forced to accommodate the new shape. I made some where the finger cut-out shape created an inward intrusion into the square, and others where the thumb shape created a downward protrusion off the bottom edge of the square.

At the same time, I experimented with other “intrusions” into a conventional pictorial shape, drawing with wavy shaped bottom edges or sides that were all determined by the shape and scale of different body parts. These drawings eventually led to the paintings, with a change in material and scale. I don’t usually make paintings based from drawings and see the doodles only as a way to generate loose ideas and provide a framework, but not as a way to work out finished pieces.

My drawing practice pulls from its own history and the language associated to the processes and materials I’ve chosen. So, I like to think of these two practices, painting and drawing as conceptually connected, but very different, so that they function independently from each other. Although the “liquid Life” gouache drawings are the genesis for this whole new series of paintings, and have a similar image, their scale and materiality are intentionally very different from the paintings, so that you experience them differently.

In the paintings titled “In The Metabolic”, I wanted to create the illusion of deep space, following the architecture of the painting, so that you could almost dive into the centers. They’re like portals or something. The oil paint is more organic and you can feel the weight of my hand and body in the paint. The subtle gradations of monochromatic color are mutable and elemental in nature. But I wanted them to evoke other materials, like water, blood, chlorophyll, earth, smoke, fire. In addition, the scaled-up thumb shaped indents or protrusions, appear to be more like male or female body parts or tongues. I like to discover “double entendres” in shapes and imagery.

The paintings I titled “While My Painting Gently Weeps”, have more do with gravity, then the others – both literally, and pictorially. The bottom shaped edge or sides in these paintings function like a cartooned version of the wavy strokes which sets up a slight discontinuity. The two purposely don’t exactly replicate each other’s form. In these works, the painted image is not co-extensive with the canvas shape, but is not unrelated to it either. It suggests a give and take of uneasy harmony with no easy answer over whether the literal or the pictorial has the upper hand.

Things occur in my work that undermines the illusion of the painted image or its objecthood. In all of these uniquely shaped paintings, the conceptual “problem” that I continually set up for myself, is how to reconcile the shaped format with the illusory painted image. There’s a formal relationship that exists between these two seemingly antagonistic dynamics, and I view this as interesting and potent space to work within – something that’s fundamental to my artistic expression.

There is a directness and literalness to the way I am mimicking the outside shape of the stretcher, with the direction of the marks, but yet the image functions metaphorically and becomes illusionistic, suggestive or representational all at the same time. All of these qualities, obsessions and tendencies, have been in my work from the very beginning.

19

Perhaps these new paintings could be described as being a bit quieter and more reflective or somber than the last series of paintings I made, and perhaps, they’re also more minimal, but not in the true art historical sense of the word. But I think there’s also something intense about their energy. Closer to the energy you experience in belly dancing as opposed to hip hop or jazz. It is an energy enhanced by focus and constraints. For me it’s about creating an evocative image, using repeating gestures that have a specificity, sensuality, and spontaneity, but which are also somewhat restrained and don’t slip into being purely process driven, or purely optical. Ultimately, I want to create images that expose the self and body in some way, while alluding to the figure and landscape, or more specifically, looking at the figure as a landscape, with the landscape being inside the body.

Karin Davie Seattle, 2021

21

17

WORKS ON PAPER

Liquid Life no 1 (Large), 2011, gouache on shaped cut paper, 42 x 41 inches (106.7 x 104.1 cm)

23

Liquid Life no 2 (Large), 2011, gouache on shaped cut paper, 41 x 41 inches (104.1 x 104.1 cm)

Liquid Life no 3 (Large), 2011, gouache on shaped cut paper, 41 x 41 inches (104.1 x 104.1 cm)

25

Liquid Life with Spine no 3 (Extra Large), 2012, gouache on shaped cut paper, 48 x 41 inches (121.9 x 104.1 cm)

Liquid Life with Spine no 4 (Extra Large), 2012, gouache on shaped cut paper, 60 3/8 x 30 3/8 inches (153.4 x 77.2 cm)

27

Karin Davie’s Studio

SELECTED PAST EXHIBITIONS

Left: Karin Davie, Between My Eye and Heart no. 12, 2005, oil on canvas, 66 x 84 inches (167.6 x 213.3 cm), photo courtesy the artist

33

Karin Davie: Dangerous Curves, Albright Knox Museum, NY, 2005 Installation view

34

33

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

35

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

37

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

39

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

41

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

43

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

45

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

47

Installation view at Albright Knox Museum, NY

49

Karin Davie, Underworlds, Agnes Etherington Art Centre, 2007 Installation view

51

Installation view Agnes Etherington Art Centre

53

Installation view Agnes Etherington Art Centre

55

SELECTED PRESS FOR IT’S A WAVY WAVY WORLD

57

59

61

63

65

67

69

71

73

75

77

79

81

81

83

KARIN DAVIE Born 1965 in Toronto, Canada Lives and works in Seattle, WA EDUCATION

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

1989

2021

1987

MFA, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI BFA, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

SELECTED SOLO AND TWO-PERSON EXHIBITIONS

2021

2018 2013 2011 2008 2007

2006

2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 1999 1997 1996 1994 1993 1992

Karin Davie: It’s a Wavy Wavy World, CHART, New York, NY New Paintings & Drawings by Karin Davie, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden Liquid Life Drawings, Inman Gallery, Houston, TX Shadows, Liquids & Life: New Works on Paper, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, Canada Karin Davie: Liquid Life - New works on paper, James Harris Gallery, Seattle, WA Karin Davie: Symptomania Paintings, Aldrich Musem of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT LED Drawings & New Sculpture, Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY Karin Davie Underworlds, Agnes Etherington Art Center, Kingston, Ontario, Canada Karin Davie: Dangerous Curves, Albright Knox Museum, Buffalo, NY Karin Davie: The Body’s Mind, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm Sweden Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY Galleria Il Capricorno, Venice, Italy Mario Diacono at Ars Libri, Boston, MA SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe, NM Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY Until Now, Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY White Cube, London, England Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY Turner & Runyon Gallery, Dallas, TX Mario Diacono Gallery, Boston, MA Fawbush Gallery, New York, NY Kim Light Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Feature, Inc., New York, NY Jason Rubell Gallery, Miami Beach, FL

2020 2018 2017

2016 2015 2014

2012

The Last Truth of the New (working title), DeBoer Gallery, Los Angeles CA Judith Linhares: The Artist as Curator, Sarasota Art Museum, Sarasota, FL I Was Looking at the Black and White World (It Seemed So Exciting), Ashes/Ashes Gallery, New York, NY, curated by Michael St. John Photosynthesis, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden 40th Anniversary Exhibition, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden No Man’s Land: Women Artists from the Rubell Family Collection, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC Her Crowd: New Art by Women from Our Neighbors’ Private Collections, Bruce Museum of Arts & Science, Greenwich, CT The Silo, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, NY No Man’s Land: Women Artists from the Rubell Family Collection, Rubell Family Collection, Miami, FL Capture the Rapture, CB1 Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, Curated by Rory Devine.

Contemporary Art from the Permanent Collection, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C. I was a double, Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, NY. Created collaboratively by Tang Museum Dayton Director Ian Berry and New York-based composer David Lang.

Buzz, Nara Roesler Gallery, curated by Vik Muniz, Sao Paulo, Brazil New Abstraction from the Pacific Northwest, curated by Elizabeth Leach, US Bank’s new Ascent program, Seattle, WA Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art from the Kaplan & Levi Collection. Art From the Permanent Collection, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA Watch This Space: Contemporary Art from the AGO Collection, The Art Gallery of Ontario, Canada The Indiscipline of Painting, Mead Gallery, University of Warwick, UK

2011

2010

2008

2007

2006

The Indiscipline of Painting, Tate St. Ives International and Contemporary Art, Cornwall, UK Art First: From the Collection of The Museum Art Center Buenos Aires, Sculptor Pablo Atchugarry’s Foundation, Punta del Este, Uruguay Love in Vein: Editions Fawbush Projects & Artists 2005 – 2010, Gering & Lopez Gallery, New York, NY Between Picture and Viewer: The Image in Contemporary Painting, Visual Arts Gallery, School Of Visual Arts, New York, NY, Curated by Tom Huhn and Isabel Taube Gallery Artists, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden From the Permanent Collection, Art Gallery of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Group Show, Parisian Laundry, Montreal 2041, From the Erich Marx Collection, Artnews Projects, Berlin, Germany Paragons: New Abstraction from the Albright –Knox Art Gallery, Dorothy McCarthy Gallery, University of Toronto Scarborough, Ontario The 30th Anniversary, PART II, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm REMIX: Recent Acquisitions Works on Paper - Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY Kim Light Gallery - Early 90’s, Kim light - Light Box, Culver City, Los Angeles, CA The Oppenheimer Collection, The Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City The Maramotti Collection, The Maramotti Museum, Reggio Emilia, Italy, curated by Mario Diacono Lines, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX, curated by Susie Rosmarin “e Ricomincio da Tre”, Studio La Cita, Verona, Italy, curated by Luca Massimo Barbero & Maria Rosa Sossai ‘Abstraction’, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto, Ontario, Canada New Trajectories 1: Relocations: Recent Painting, Drawing, Multi-Media work from the Ovitz Family Collection, Los Angeles, CA Cooley Gallery, Reed College, Portland, OR

2005

2004

2003 2002 2001 2000

1999

Extreme Abstraction, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY Big Band, Galerie Les Filles du Calvaire, Brussels, Belgium and Galerie Les Filles du Calvaire, Paris, France View Eight: A Few Domestic Objects Interrogate a Few Works of Art, Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY Recent Acquisitions, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY Art on Paper 2004, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC View Eight: A Few Domestic Objects Interrogate a Few Works of Art, Mary Boone Gallery, New York, NY OnLine, Feigen Contemporary, New York, NY Art Downtown: New York Painting and Sculpture, 48 Wall Street, New York, NY Against the Wall: Painting Against the Grid, Surface, Frame, Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA 7 Young American Artists, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden Post-Pop, Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, PA New Work: Abstraction, Hosfelt Gallery, San Francisco, CA Hypermental, Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland and Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany Emotional Rescue: The Contemporary Art Project Collection, Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle, WA Untitled group show, Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY Post-Hypnotic, The Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH; University Galleries, Illinois State University, Normal, IL; Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL Atlanta College of Art Gallery, Atlanta, GA Ultra Buzz: Karin Davie, Peter Hopkins, Tom Moody, James Siena, Fred Tomaselli, Gallery of Art, Johnson County Community College, Overland Park, KN At Century’s End: The John P. Morrissey Collection of Nineties’ Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Lake Worth, FL

1998

1997

1996

1995 1994

1993 1992

American Academy Invitational Exhibition of Painting & Sculpture, The American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY Girls’ School, Brenau University, Gainesville, GA Sassy Nuggets, Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York, NY Group Show, Teachers Insurance and Annuity Associations, New York, NY Projects 63: Karin Davie, Udomsak Krisanamis, Bruce Pearson, Fred Tomaselli, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY After the Fall: Aspects of Abstract Painting Since 1970, Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, Staten Island, NY New York/North York, Gallery of North York, North York, Canada Works on Paper, Curt Marcus Gallery, New York, NY Landscape Reclaimed, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT Painting in an Expanding Field, Usdan Gallery, Bennington College, Bennington, VT Individuals on Paper, Devon Golden Fine Art Gallery, New York, NY Gallery Artists, Fawbush Gallery, New York, NY New York on Paper, Jim Schmidt Fine Art, St. Louis, MO Gallery Artists, Fawbush Gallery, New York, NY Abstraction … Tradition of Collecting in Miami, Center for the Fine Arts, Miami, FL Hunk, Jose Freire Fine Art, New York, NY Promising Suspects, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT Again, N.A.M.E. Gallery, Chicago, IL The Division Between Breath and Air, Patrick Callery Gallery, New York, NY Jacqueline Humphries, Jessica Stockholder, Karin Davie, John Good Gallery, New York, NY The Radio Show: Unrealized Projects, Artists Space, New York, NY Off Balance, Jason Rubell Gallery, Palm Beach, FL Collector’s Choice of Emerging Artists, Vered Gallery, East Hampton, NY Summer Invitational, Blum Helman Warehouse, New York, NY

1991

Abstraction, Amy Lipton Gallery, New York, NY Ageometry, Michael Klein, Inc., New York, NY Ecstasy Shop, Dooley Le Callellaine, New York, NY Benefit Exhibition, White Columns, New York City, NY Benefit Exhibition, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY In Full Effect, White Columns, New York, NY Ornament, John Post Lee, New York, NY

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Art Gallery of Ontario Smithsonian Museum of American Art Seattle Art Museum Orlando Art Museum Tang Museum Skidmore College Albright Knox Art Museum Rubell Family Museum Norton Museum West Palm Beach Nerman Museum Of Contemporary Art - Oppenheimer Collection Museum Art Center Buenos Aires Paul Allen Collection Bank of Montreal Margulies Collection Marx Collection Germany Goldman Sachs Collection Kunstverein in Hamburg Marimotti Collection, Italy The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth Prudential Life Insurance Kunstverein in Hamburg Germany Palm Springs Museum North Carolina Museum of Art

74 Franklin Street New York, NY 10013 chart-gallery.com

All artworks © Karin Davie photo credit: Spike Mafford