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Huntington opens Lesley Vance & Ricky Swallow exhibition

The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens presents an exhibition of contemporary paintings and sculpture by Lesley Vance & Ricky Swallow on view Nov. 10, 2012-March 11, 2013.

The stately Beaux Arts mansion that was once the home of Henry and Arabella Huntington is renowned for its collection of European art. In “Lesley Vance and Ricky Swallow,” the artists’ contemporary work is placed in the context of the gallery’s Old Master paintings, Renaissance bronzes, 18th-century French decorative arts, and British grand manner portraits.

Approximately nine abstract paintings by Vance and 12 domestic-scale sculptures by Swallow are installed in an upstairs room of the mansion. A number of the works were made especially for the exhibition.

Wisconsin native Lesley Vance is inspired by Old Master painting, including 17th-century still lifes. Of her evolution toward abstraction, Vance said, “There isn’t much abstract painting that feels warm and intimate. I wanted abstraction that works like representation, that invites you in.” Her work has received increasing critical acclaim since 2010, when it was exhibited in the Whitney Biennial.

Ricky Swallow grew up in Australia, which he represented in the 2005 Venice Biennale. Like Vance, Swallow is interested in the still-life tradition. His most recent sculpture often takes as a point of departure household objects that he models in simple materials, including cardboard, then casts in bronze and patinates with surfaces that recall ceramic glazes. – www.huntington.org