dm contemporary

DM CONTEMPORARY is pleased to announce its first exhibition of the New Year, WARM UP, CHILL DOWN, THAW OUT, featuring recent paintings by Macyn Bolt, works on paper by Matthew Langley, and wall sculptures by Richard Bottwin. Simply speaking, the exhibition is an invitation to leave winter at the door, and come in explore and rekindle your passion for art. Additionally, and in keeping with the current events, this is equally an invitation to shed disenchantment, and encourage the rediscovery of art’s affirmative life force, and its ability to inspire and motivate us to find new answers and fresh solutions.

The works in this exhibition are abstract, minimal, and vibrant in color, but beyond these common characteristics, there are many layers of visual and metaphorical layers to peel. Macyn Bolt’s use of color and shape to create two equal compositional divisions within the painting, symmetrically contrasting or mirroring each other, generates tension and energy within the work. Employing reductive geometry he allows spatial polarities to ricochet off each other to ultimately find a tentative equilibrium. Richard Bottwin's abstract, geometric, and architecturally or object inspired wall sculptures are minimal, playful, and characterized by the lavish use of materials – mostly wood and paint. The simple forms are flawlessly constructed out of plywood and hardwood slabs that are sometimes laminated with exotic wood veneers, or painted with bright colors, and sometimes the wood is left raw or lightly stained with unusual stain colors to reveal the natural grain. These wall sculptures often hide an element of surprise, since the plywood surfaces are configured to reveal surprising shapes and patterns with shifts in the viewer’s perspective. Matthew Langley’s scaled down works on paper are the result of a yearlong project in which the artist took a break from his then current work, which was very structured, and over the course of a year, allowed himself a chance to explore anything that popped into his head creating a painting each day. The ‘painting-a-day’ series’ focus on approaching work with openness, eagerness, and a lack of preconception of the final outcome has enabled the artist to find new ways of working and uncovered qualities about his work that were previously unknown to him.