Posted on
2018-04-23
This show features large-scale paintings from the artist’s Wrestlers series, which demonstrate Dunham’s continued exploration of and fascination with interpretations of the nude body with particular attention to the male form. Made over the last year, these paintings reflect a clear new direction for the artist through the lens of the distinctive approach to painting that Dunham has employed and tinkered with throughout his career. Using the visual language of mythological depictions of wrestling, mined from art historical
sources and his own memory, these paintings propose new through lines in Dunham’s practice that are both formal and autobiographical in nature.
Providing male counterparts to the female figures Dunham has continuously returned to, the wrestlers introduce a variety of visceral and psychological narratives that incorporate an amalgam of recurring themes prevalent throughout his oeuvre, namely playfulness, violence, and sexuality. Set in vibrant and abstracted landscapes adorned with trees, flowers, birds, and dogs, the male protagonists brutally assault one another, gently hold each other, or lie lifeless on the rugged terrain. Each composition provides a unique insight into the physical and mental struggles among these competing figures, either through straightforward scenes of men attacking each other, or through the documentation of defeated men left for dead. This psychology is intensified through the formal framing of the men within the rectangular bounds of the canvas, as well as through the repeated insertion of jet black birds that witness the violent matches and aftermath of each battle, predatorily looming over the turbulent scenes.
Opposite – Any Day, 2017
Exhibition runs through to June 16th, 2018
Gladstone Gallery
515 West 24th Street
NY-10011 New York
USA
gladstonegallery.com
