MODEL CITIZENS
DANNY LICUL SOLO EXHIBITION
curated by Remy Amezcua
March 21-April 16, 2014
Opening reception: Friday, March 21, 6.00-9.00 PM
278 GRAND STREET, 2ND FL (Btwn Eldridge and Forsyth)
gallery SENSEI is pleased to present a solo exhibition of Danny Licul curated by Remy Amezcua.
This is the first exhibition of Licul’s work at gallery Sensei. The show will feature several large-scale paintings alongside the reference materials that helped generate them. Several small-scale works will also be shown in the exhibit.
Licul’s layered, immersive paintings are fictional reenactments of social interactions that mold the themes of identity and habits. As the artist himself explains “I’m exploring power plays in a parochial school setting. The model based on the grammar school I attended, gives me a tangible starting point, with access to reserves of sensory experience that inform the work”.
The model he constructed, is populated with clay figures and furniture that serves as his movie set. He constructs his paintings as if behind a lens; employing cinematic angles, cropping and deep focus shots as well as layered imagery reminiscent of multiple exposures. He routinely takes pictures of the staged sets, Photoshop’s them for various effects and uses them as springboards for the paintings. Characters of Licul’s works are archetypal explorations of forming personalities in a cultural rich atmosphere, not unlike NYC.
Danny Licul is a painter living and working in New York City. Solo shows include Model Citizens, gallery SENSEI, NYC; Moral Investments and Other Follies, Wall Street Journal Lobby Gallery, NYC; Playing with My selves, Chashama Times Square Gallery, NYC. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally in galleries and art fairs since 2000. He attended the Yale summer school of art, Norfolk, in 1997, was awarded an LMCC Swing Space in 2008, and a residency at The Herziliya Center for the Creative Arts, Israel in 2011. He earned his BFA from Queens College in 1999.