RICHARD GORMAN

In a series of new large-scale paintings on canvas, Gorman presents an exploratory new take on the ‘emotional geometry’ for which he has become celebrated in the past two decades. Approached with a lightness of touch, the works carry a renewed sense of movement and immediacy: angular, interlocking blocks of colour seem to spiral outwards, while radial shapes pirouette on their axis.

As Gorman’s understanding and mastery of colour has deepened, he has begun to use it not only as a harmonic device, but as an active and animating element in his paintings: flat blocks of colour step to an offbeat rhythm, laid down in a jazz cool palette. Giving a nod to the gestural, expressionist works with which Gorman began his career in the 1980s, this new body of work takes on a more liberated, looser and freer painterly approach, all while demonstrating the intuitive balancing of colour, form and line that his work is prized for.

Recent solo exhibitions include: At Home, Oscar Humphries Gallery, London (2019); Keijo, Chigasaki Museum, Japan, (2019); Iwano, Kerlin Gallery, Dublin, (2016); KAN, Assab One, Milan, (2015); KIN, The MAC, Belfast, (2014); Richard Gorman, Painting and Prints, Mitaka City Gallery of Art & Ashikaga City Museum of Art Japan (Both 2010); Shuffle, Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin, Ireland (2009); Richard Gorman: Oeuvres Nouvelles, Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris, (2007); Homerun, Kerlin Gallery Dublin, (2003); Paintings and Paper Works, Koriyama City Museum of Art Koriyama, Japan, (2002); Nine Paintings, Crawford Art Gallery, Cork, (2001) and Itami City Gallery of Art and Mitaka City Art Foundation, Japan, (1999). Group exhibitions include: Der Spiegel Galerie, Cologne, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin and ’A Measured Quietude’, an exhibition of contemporary Irish drawings, which toured the Berkeley Art Museum, California and The Drawing Centre, New York.