Opening Reception: Friday, March 29, 5:00—7:00 PM
Overlap, the first solo exhibition for Phillis Ideal at David Richard Gallery, features selections of recent abstract paintings from 2 distinct bodies of work. The first is playful, consisting of colorful gestural abstractions with bold rhythms and vigorous brush strokes in a range of sizes. The second is a smaller body of work, attenuated with respect to smaller dimensions, reductive color palette and fewer brush strokes. The paintings are minimal, evoking a calm with the artist’s predominate use of black, white and a range of greys as well as an emphasis on line and creating a meditative state.
Ideal’s paintings are richly layered with a mixture of color, bold and gestural brushstrokes and collaged elements. The wonderful compositions and color palettes evolve during her process of experimentation in the studio, conflating and referencing many art historical movements and tendencies from modernism to Abstract Expressionism and Color Field to Minimalism and beyond—creating her own language out of the many forms of abstraction. Her art-making practice is not meant to be representational, yet the finished artwork, frequently with suggestive titles, is often referential but in different ways to different viewers—a hallmark of great abstraction.
Phillis Ideal has exhibited in major museums and galleries in San Francisco, Santa Fe and New York City. Her work has been shown and collected in many private, corporate and public collections such as MH de Young Museum, Oakland Museum of Fine Arts, Newport Harbor Art Museum and Fine Arts Museum of Santa Fe. In recent years she has exhibited her work in Otranto, Italy, Berlin, Germany and Paris, France. Her academic experience includes teaching at San Francisco State, UC Berkeley, and Sarah Lawrence.
David Richard Gallery is located in the Santa Fe Railyard Arts District and specializes in post-war abstract art including Abstract Expressionism, Color Field, geometric and hard-edge painting, Op, Pop, Minimalism, Feminism and conceptualism in a variety of media. Featuring both historic and contemporary artwork, the gallery represents many established artists who were part of important art historical movements and tendencies that occurred during the 1950s through the 1980s on both the east and west coasts. The gallery also represents artist estates, emerging artists and offers secondary market works.