"In Arms" a solo exhibition by Dylan Graham at Artspace in Rosebank, Johannesburg

Dylan Graham presented his first major solo exhibition at Artspace gallery on 27th August 2009 at 18h00.

Entitled "In Arms" the exhibition is a collection of new paintings by the artists, rendered in oil on wood in Graham's distinctive voice.

Geraldine Fenn is a full time jewellery designer based in Johannesburg. She completed her Masters degree in Fine Art at Wits in 2005 and is a founding partner of Tinsel, a retail outlet that features work exclusively from contemporary South African jewellery.

When choosing a theme, image or approach for the making of a painting, there are various angles from which to proceed. Some artists want to 'say' something relating to (for instance) politics or contemporary issues. Some are haunted by disturbing or pleasing images, and seek to explore these relentlessly.

"I try to make art free of message, narrative or concept, but merely an interpretation of what I see."

As a result, a glance at the range of visual imagery in Graham's paintings show glimpses of many different kinds of objects and scenes -dustbins, brooms, bird cages, toys and people appear.

Although Graham strives toward the unbiased observation of whatever presents itself, by so doing he captures the ambiguities and dualities present within people, and phenomena.

In this way life and death, the beautiful and the ugly, virtue and vice are seen to co-exist, sometimes to blur or merge. The result is a rare and direct confrontation of reality through the eyes of the artist.

Graham strives to work at each painting free of preconceived ideas and the baggage of art discourse - a challenge for a formally trained artist and lecturer. Here a strange incongruity appears, as Graham can be regarded as a 'traditionalist', yet does not intend to appropriate or borrow from the past. Thus the artist's figures and portraits approach the psychological depth of Rembrandt's representations, and yet Graham has 'only' tried to paint - brushstroke for brushstroke, confronting the canvas in the language of the painterly medium: colour, surface, placing, light and dark, tactile presence.

Graham can, and does, observe and represent, but the images are called forth with honesty and directness: not as renditions but as apparitions or 'guests' called forth by the artist's absence of attachment.

Heidegger, a renown German philosopher, authored Being and Time in 1927, one of the most significant philosophical works. The basis of his work was to grapple with the concept of a 'sense of being'. The question Heidegger asks in the introduction to Being and Time is: what is the entity that will give access to the question of the meaning of being? Heidegger's answer is that it can only be that entity for whom the question of being is important, the entity for whom being matters.<sup>1

1</sup> Wikipedia, Being and Time, accessed 11 August 2009.

The artist arrives at the canvas, labours without assumption, facilitates the artwork into being and, lastly, steps aside for the viewer to determine the outcomes and implications.

The exhibition will be opened with a glass of wine on Thursday 27th August at 18h00 at Artspace, Chester Court, 142 Jan Smuts Ave, Rosebank.

The show runs until 16th September 2009.
Artspace is open from 10h00-17h30 Tuesday - Friday, 10h00- 15h30 on Saturdays.
www.artspace-jhb.co.za

For more information and images contact

Taryn Cohn
Media Liaison for Artspace Gallery
083 6715139
taryncohn@artsourcesouthafrica.co.za