SPOTLIGHT

Hunted Projects Spotlight aims to place emphasis on the story behind a single artwork, told from the perspective of the artist themselves. Spotlight will provide you with unique insights into the artists practice, process, inspirations and influences.

Ross Chisholm

Naples

oil on canvas

40.2cm x 30cm

2022

Ross Chisholm deconstructs notions of traditional portraiture by skilfully painting figures from found photographs and reproductions, and then interrupting them with visual breaks in the form of geometric abstractions, loose brushwork, and thick dabs of paint. His subjects are borrowed from several distinct art historical and vernacular styles, in many cases 18th and 19th century grand portraiture, found holiday snapshots and slides from the 1970s and geometric abstraction. Chisholm distorts and isolates the figures in his paintings until a fixed sense of time and identity are rendered ambiguous.

‘Naples’ is a conflation of several different images painted over several years. In its first iteration its main source material was taken from a Gainsborough portrait. I’d sent it over to be in an exhibition at Eigen+Art in Berlin. It lay dormant for a while when it returned to my studio until I decided to reignite it. It went through several other stages...the Gainsborough image giving way to figures from William Blake illustrations before dissolving into abstraction. I started to play around with fluorescent paints at that time and I was attracted to some of the fabric patterns from found 35mm slides I’d collected. After it turned into a fairly standard portrait I needed to change it but I wanted to keep the fluorescent pattern so I decided to overlay other figures onto it. Ultimately I think of it has having solidified into an abstract, almost pathological portrait. The multiple figures seem to me like organic protrusions. From the source materials of society to family portraits...from the continual repainting, to the fluctuation of abstraction and representation, it contains a lot of the elements of my practice and its an example of something I think has found it’s own logic and balance.

Ross Chisholm, January 2023

Below is a selection of images that illustrates the various stages of modification and adaption that the painting went through.

Ross Chisholm (b.1977) studied at Goldsmiths University, he lives and works in London, UK. His work has been widely exhibited throughout Europe and the United States as well as China, Australia and the United Arab Emirates, with solo shows at Si Shang Art Museum, Beijing, CN (2016), Eigen + Art Lab, Berlin, DE (2015), Green Art Gallery, Dubai (2014), Ibid Projects, London (2012), Marc Jancou Contemporary, New York (2011), and Grieder Contemporary, Zurich (2010). His work is included in numerous prestigious art collections, including: Si Shang Art Museum Collection, Beijing, Zabludowicz Collection London, Mario Testino, London, The Horts, New York, JRP Ringier, Zurich, Eileen S. Kaminsky Family Foundation, USA, Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, and numerous international private collections. Hunted Projects hosted Chisholm’s online exhibition Grave Architecture in July 2022, and his work has been included in 2 previous group exhibitions: #Paintingssssss. (2016) and Works on Paper (2015).

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