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CHARLES ARNOLDI OUTLIER

January 17—February 24, 2024

Opening Reception

Saturday, January 20 th 4 6 pm

A versatile, ever evolving artist, known for working with non-traditional materials, Charles Arnoldi carved his own distinctive presence in the realm of contemporary abstraction by successfully blurring the lines between painting and sculpture while maintaining a constantly expanding vocabulary of artistic expression. His continually intuitive and physical approach to making art is evident in OUTLIER, the recent body of work at Scott Richards Contemporary Art.

The artist’s gusto for deconstructing and redefining the pictorial plane is best expressed by two larger-than-life wall reliefs titled Missionary and Urban Planning, that stand at the forefront of the exhibition. Painted on deeply jagged surfaces with brightly colored, thick acrylic paint, these compositions reference the artist’s earlier iconic “chainsaw paintings” but instead of wood, they are carved from light polyethene foam. The other works on display, however, signal a clear departure from his previous explorations and demonstrate a new, free-form approach to both sculpture and painting.

In stark contrast to the monumental wall installations, OUTLIER includes a few recent wood sculptures of modest proportions that bear the mark of the ax and the line of the saw. Beautiful in their simplicity, these wood pieces serve as building blocks to the artist’s recent explorations, while their rough-hewn forms are mirrored by several acrylic paintings on canvas such as Passion, Shoot Out and Channeler. Depicting an engaging play on visual perspective, the paintings clearly reflect a deeply rooted sculptural practice, surprising the viewer with juxtaposing, irregular shapes, bold colors, and energetic patterns that cleverly seem to pop in and out of perspective.

For close to 50 years, Charles Arnoldi has devoted a deep commitment to experimentation, and a tireless focus on studio production. Arriving in Southern California in the mid 1960’s, from Dayton, Ohio, he began an ever-evolving career by studying at the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles and winning LACMA’s New or Young Talent Award in 1969. In the highly experimental Los Angeles art scene of the late 1960s and 1970s, Arnoldi established an aesthetic separate from his peers. His seminal “stick paintings” where, instead of painting on canvas, he utilized actual tree branches as a vehicle to draw lines through space, were the first works to win him international accolades. In 1972, he was invited to participate in Harald Szeemann’s seminal Documenta V in Kassel, Germany, and later went on to receive two NEA Artist Fellowships, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Maestro Grant from the California Arts Council.

His works can be found in the collections of many major museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, The Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, The National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California. Charles Arnoldi lives and works in Venice, California.

78 × 60 inches

UNTITLED (23.123)

2023, chainsawed and assembled wood and oxidized paint, 20 × 17.5 × 6 inches

MISSIONARY

2022, chainsawed foam with plaster and acrylic 84 × 71 inches

URBAN PLANNING

2023, chainsawed foam with plaster and acrylic 84 × 71 × 5 inches

BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO 2023, acrylic on canvas

51 × 90 inches

PASSION

2020, acrylic on canvas

74 × 66 inches

UNTITLED (23.192)

2023, chainsawed and assembled wood

23.5 × 9 × 15 inches

CHANNELER

2021, acrylic on canvas

55 × 46 inches

UNTITLED (21.228)

2021, oil on linen

24 × 20 inches

16 × 12 inches each

UNTITLED (23.135)

2023, chainsawed and assembled wood, oxidized paint 14.5 × 12 × 6 inches

Additional Works

UNTITLED

2000, gouache on collaged paper

20 × 28 inches

1989, acrylic on canvas

50 × 42 inches

THRONE

2010, acrylic on assembled canvases

63 × 28 inches

UNTITLED (15.104)

2015, gouache on paper

14 × 10.25 inches

“I’ve found that by making art constantly, one idea leads into another and another, creating infinite possibilities.

Charles

Public Collections

Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation, Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena

Orange County Museum of Palm Springs Desert Museum,

Portland Art Museum, Portland,

San Diego Museum of Art,

San Francisco Museum of Modern

Santa Barbara Museum of Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Smithsonian American Art

J.B. Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Menil Foundation, Houston Metropolitan Museum of Art, Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Museum of Contemporary

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