Description
‘Poke’ by James Bonnici
Artist: James Bonnici
Title: ‘Poke’
Medium: Oil on cradled birch panel
Dimensions: 15.75″ x 11.8″
Framing: Unframed – Ready to hang
Year of Creation: 2023
Artwork Will Ship From: Australia
About the Artwork:
The two paintings on show in the exhibition ‘Follow the Universe’ are both portraits that subvert the representation of the physical world through a process of distortion and manipulation of banal, everyday imagery to transform familiar and recognisable forms into something unsettling. Through this process, ordinary figures are imbued with a sense of rupture, evoking a strange otherworldly quality.
These works explore spacial devices that create the illusion of an opening breaking through the two dimensional plane to reveal a world beyond the one represented on the surface. Here, what lies beneath the surface of our constructed reality? We are reminded of the unknown, intangible and immaterial, phenomena at the edge of knowledge.
In the disruptive nature and incongruities of these artworks, we are confronted with images that express the idea of the psychological intertwined with the physical, where emotional states such as fear, paranoia and disgust are embodied in the forms of these figures. The disturbing imagery conveyed in in these works is made accessible through the use of fine, meticulous oil painting, where subjects are beautifully rendered and traditionally composed within the historical context of portrait painting, making them simultaneously inviting as well as repellent. – James Bonnici
About the Artist:
(Artist Bio)
James Bonnici is a contemporary artist based in Melbourne, Australia, working in the tradition of oil painting and various drawing techniques. Since graduating with a degree in Fine Arts at RMIT, he has exhibited extensively in Australia, Europe and the United States in both solo and group exhibitions, as well as being a finalist in various art prizes including the Paul Guest Prize at the Bendigo Art Gallery and the Lyn McCrea Drawing Prize at the Noosa regional Gallery. In addition to his contemporary art practice, James Bonnici is part of the education community at Melbourne Grammar school where he teaches drawing and painting. His artworks are in collections in Europe, the United States, The Middle East and Australia.