Tue 9 Feb 2010
Sarah Joncas and Ciou at Roq La Rue Gallery
Posted by jodavid under Art , Art Galleries , EventsNo Comments
Roq La Rue Gallery
presents
Sarah Joncas
“Shadow Play”
new paintings
And
Ciou
“Mysterious Flowers”
paintings and drawings
Opening Friday February 12th 6-9pm
Show runs through March 6th
Sarah Joncas new show focuses on the theme of shadows. Her work is primarily narrative portraiture, but is imbued with a sense of cinematic spatiality and a contemporary noir sensibility. Influenced by artists diverse in scope as Van Eyck, Lautrec, Hopper, Varo, Mucha, and Frida Kahlo, Sarah was also greatly influenced by the newly emerging Anime scene as a child. As Anime became more pervasive in US culture, it was readily embraced for its approach of using complex narratives and emotional maturity within a cartoon framework. This use of a cartoon as a form of fine art “character” has been one of the stapes behind the Pop Surrealism scene and Sarah’s melancholy heroines are examples of the range of subtle nuances that can be achieved using that as a base despite its seeming limitations. She has exhibited her paintings in New York, Los Angeles, Palm Springs, and Rome.
Ciou hails from Paris, France. Her work features the admittedly well worn standard of spooky girls and their animals consorts, however Ciou’s unapologetic punk style (reminiscent of teenage notebook scrawls dialed up to 11) breathes a new brash life into the theme. Her sweet and sour heavy metal nymphs live out their wild carnivalesque fairytales on found vintage papers, taken from old medical books, dictionaries, and nature manuals. Her line-work is by turns thickly layered like decadent rocker girl eyeliner and then meticulously thin and ornate like stitchwork. Ciou has exhibited in Paris, Amsterdam,Brussels, Toulouse,Berlin, Los Angeles, Rome,and Barcelona. This is her first US solo show. She also has about of her work entitled “Chat Siamose”.
