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San Francisco Museum of Modern Art presents New Work. Richard Aldrich

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art presents New Work: Richard Aldrich an exhibition on view through March 25, 2012.

Richard Aldrich, Untitled, 2010; oil, wax, graphite and collage on linen; 84 x 58 inches; courtesy Bortolami Gallery; © Richard Aldrich

The presentation brings together an array of new paintings by the New York–based artist anchored by a selection of earlier pieces that show the diversity of his work and the expansive possibilities of painting itself. Organized by Gary Garrels, SFMOMA Elise S. Haas Senior Curator of Painting and Sculpture, the exhibition continues the museum’s New Work series dedicated to featuring the most innovative expressions of contemporary art.

Aldrich pursues an open-ended exploration of painting and uses its fundamental elements—canvas, stretcher bars, paint—to interrogate and celebrate the intellectual and sensual conundrums of the art form. Deeply aware of the historical precedents of abstract painting, he sometimes evokes images and memories, while at other times uses the elements of painting to their own ends. Inherent throughout his work are issues of perception and understanding, explorations of the immediacy of the present moment grounded in language and past experience.

The presentation at SFMOMA will include some 14 works of both small, intimate panels and larger canvases that range from resolutely abstract to hints of representation, minimalist to richly colorful and painterly. Aldrich’s works incorporate paint, collage, and found objects, claiming everything within the boundaries of the canvas as the territory of painting. His range in painting reveals an ongoing effort to understand his relationship to the history of painting as well as to the act of painting, resulting in a body of work that extends tradition but remains distinctly personal.

“Aldrich reinvents and extends our understanding of painting—a medium and form of art that has often been fundamentally challenged over the past hundred years—as a vital medium for contemporary art,” says Garrels.

Aldrich was born in 1975 in Hampton, Virginia, and received his BFA from Ohio State University in 1998. He currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. His work was featured at The Saint Louis Art Museum (2011) and the 2010 Whitney Biennial and has shown in Europe and the United States at institutions including White Columns, New York; Midway Contemporary Art Center, Minneapolis; Palais De Tokyo, Paris; and P.S.1 Center for Contemporary Art, Long Island City, New York, among many others.

A free illustrated brochure will be produced in conjunction with this exhibition, featuring images of Aldrich’s work and an extended interview with the artist. – www.sfmoma.org

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