Jigsaws and Scumbles…The New Abstract!

The Paul Kolker collection presents Paul Kolker: Jigsaws and Scumbles…The New Abstract!, opening on September 18, 2014. Kolker uses dissected shapes, which he calls jigsaws; each painted in layers over the other as scumbles; the painterly analog of halftone phases. Among the thirty-five paintings and light and mirror sculptures in the exhibition, is a series of paintings, United Shapes, 2014, in which jigsaw cut-outs of each of the US states is scumbled one over the other; as depicted in the detail above. The show’s opening on September 18 was originally scheduled for the night of the 9/11 memorial, with United Shapes and its minimal, hard-edged and scumbled fields of color declaring a narrative of the solidarity of the United States of America.

As in his forty-three prior solo shows, Kolker creates his works through a procedural paradigm using new media; including painting, light sculpture, photography, video, screen- and inkjet printing and drawing. Substantively, his works remind the viewer of the dots and pixels of our digital flat screens and print media. He also treats each exhibition as a unified work of art and, therefore, self-curates his exhibitions in his Chelsea gallery adjacent to his studio.

Jigsaws and Scumbles is a continuation of the artist’s conceptual practice founded in the new fractal geometry of Benoit Mandelbrot; wherein a jagged rock becomes a fractal, or primordial form, which configures the more expansive jagged coastline. Whether viewed from the seashore or from space, the core shape of the fractal, as a jagged structure, is the same. Kolker uses this parallactic view from afar or from up-close as his method of treating the subject matter of his works. Whether figural or abstract, because they are derived from the same fractal shape, the works speak to the viewer with a common narrative.

All works in this exhibition are derived from the circular outline of the dot, and their lines, loops and curves; and relate back to such exhibitions as Over and Over, 2011, Halftones and Ishidots, 2014 and Dot Derivatives, 2014; as described in press releases at www.paulkolker.com/exhibitions

Kolker, (born 1935), has MD and JD degrees. He has practiced cardiothoracic surgery from 1969 through 2012 on Long Island and is Emeritus Chief, Cardiothoracic Surgery, North Shore/LIJ at Glen Cove Hospital. For more than four decades, during his surgical career and education, he has conducted and developed his art practice in his home based studio. In 2001, having moved his art practice to Chelsea, he founded Studio 601; which was reorganized in 2014 into the Paul Kolker collection.

In Jigsaws and Scumbles… The New Abstract!, thirty-five paintings and sculptures are on view at the PAUL KOLKER collection, 511 West 25th Street, adjacent to the High Line in Chelsea between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues from September 18 through November 15, 2014. For further information, please contact info@paulkolker.com.