CHRIS SUCCO

Whitestone Gallery Taipei is pleased to present Chris Succo: Recent Paintings, which showcases his new works made from 2022 to 2023, including White Paintings and Stick Paintings series. This is the second solo exhibition of Succo in Taipei.

Chris Succo started his first White Paintings in the beginning of 2010. The manual layering of paint and the painterly realm’s inherent sculptural dimension prompt this multidisciplinary artist to use painting as his artistic practice. Succo has developed a unique technique. He primes with spray paint before using thick white oil paint, and canvases are filled with tense strokes and show a kind of tension in these works. Through using white oil paint, Succo deliberately restrains the impact of other colours and the colourful background is transformed into a subtle undertone supporting the gestural, dynamic painting surface.

The works Shadows (2023) and Heavy Liquid (2022) in this exhibition demonstrate Succo’s outstanding techniques. Succo uses other collaged elements on the surface, which seems to put the strong gestural painting on canvas again. These roughly cut scrapes made with transparent spray and delicate textures contrast with the colours they have been embedded. It also shows Succo’s delight in experimenting with contrasts of materials.

In the Stick Paintings, Succo’s skillful and vigorous application of oil stick creates numbers of lines, strokes, swirls and patterns on canvas. Like an archeologist’s excavation, the artist seems to use his hands to strip images away layer after layer, and then produce fabric-like textures and entangled surfaces. This large-scale series shifts in diverse styles and media but still presents a consistency with a single colour. In the spirit of Abstract Expressionism, Succo’s rapid strokes and gestural curves celebrate the limitless potential of paint and canvas.Chris Succo was born in Düsseldorf in 1979, currently living and working in Düsseldorf, Germany. Succo attended the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, where he was awarded Meisterschüler by Prof. Georg Herold in 2009, and he graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2012. Succo is best known for his abstract paintings and also works with a wide range of media, including sculpture and photography. He has exhibited widely throughout Europe and the USA such as Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf, Museo Di Capodimonte, Naples. Collections include Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf and Sammlung Alison und Peter W. Klein. His works were presented at Chanel flagship stores in New York and Miami.