LOIE HOLLOWELL

Taking a unique approach to colour, form, and texture, the artist renders the physical experience of labor immediate and visceral

.‘These works are an extension of an idea that I first explored in a ​nine-part painting series, where each split opening was representative of the nine centimetres of dilation the cervix must undergo in preparation to push out a baby,’ Hollowell says. ‘I see the consecutive nature as a kind of meditation, with each opening capturing the sensation of that moment of dilation. So, when the works are viewed in totality, you’re moving through the act of giving birth in time and space. You step from one to the other, from one contraction to the next.’

The five paintings in this show continue that examination, this time utilised as a way to explore as an exploration of more formal colour compositions. Slightly removed from the context of the first series iteration, these works are as much colour experiments as they are paintings about giving birth. Hollowell’s paintings often reflect the fantastical, uncanny nature of sexuality, pregnancy, and birth. Employing her distinctive manipulation of gradients, geometries, and dimensionality, the artist blurs the boundary between figuration and abstraction.

Beyond Pace’s Palm Beach gallery, Hollowell’s work can be found in the collection of the ICA Miami. She was the subject of a major solo exhibition at the Long Museum in Shanghai in 2021, and in 2019 her work was featured in a solo show marking the inauguration of Pace’s 540 West 25th Street gallery in New York.