THE ABSTRACTIONS OF NICKE GORNEY
"It's art like Gorney's - art without echoes of configured reality - that puts our usual way of seeing on pause. Through her abstractions she brings our perception back to the level of pure colour."
NEW YORK TIMES Color Poesies by Helen Harrison
“Ms. Gorney's paintings are chromatic abstractions inspired by diffused light. In works like ''Peep Show'' and ''Encounter,'' fleeting references can be identified, but in her more recent paintings, Ms. Gorney is preoccupied with the emotional dimensions of color. Atmosphere is still paramount; however, her tones are translucent and interactive, as in ''Seeing Red,'' with its rolling clouds of color.”
BRYANT NEWS New York, NY
“Artist Nicke Gorney finds poetry not only in the meaning of words but in the curve described by a stroke of paint or the depth of emotion embodied in color. As an abstract painter, she works in veils of color and gesture, mixing oil, gouache and acrylics to create lush surfaces that shimmer in subtle rhythms. Building up her work through many layers, she invites the viewer into its depths.”
ARTFUL VAGABOND
How to be a Slave to Color - Day 339
Color is the reason artists become painters rather than sculptors. Painters can name the particular shade of blue of the sky on a certain day. They know how to create depth, not strictly through form, but through layering and transparency of color. It’s a wild, sensuous world that painters can bring to those who are willing to take the time to experience it.
Color is what made Nicke Gorney want to be an artist in the first place. “In the beginning I wanted to control color but now I am a slave to it,” she says. Through painting, mixed media and photography, Gorney explores light passing through color in infinite variations as she works to capture an ethereal quality through the balance of technique and improvisation. “It’s all about balancing control with experimentation,” says the artist. “I have to admit that it’s far more engaging to travel through my work than to try and manipulate it. Even though I’m more conscious of the process, in many ways the outcome is unpredictable. I might set out with a specific intention in mind but I lose myself in the mystery behind it. When I’m in the moment, something remarkable happens.”
I wanted to know more about this artist who admits being a slave to color.
SerenaK:
Were you always so intensely focused on color, or did that develop and strengthen over time?
Gorney:
“I would say I was seduced by color and how it drew me in – but my sense of color did develop and strengthen over time. I’m also obsessed with luminosity. Whenever I would go to museums and galleries and see luminous paintings that were mesmerizing, I kept asking myself, ‘How did they achieve that?’”
“My intense focus on color began with my color field paintings such as, “21st Century Blues No. 5″ (above), which was part of a series of sixteen paintings I did during that period. Then I gravitated to more monochromatic work while at the same time I was moving into photography with a series of abstract photographs called BlackPrints. I blended the two mediums and created a series called Photo Rehabs.”
“Eventually I drifted back into what I would call monochrome with color, as in ‘Meta Fiction’ (below). It’s like the difference between black & white and color film from the standpoint of cinema or still photography. I love the mood, the light…the ambiance and drama of black & white, like in those films of the sixties and seventies. Actually, if you think about it, monochrome is a color or shades of a color so why make a distinction?”
SerenaK:
Do you think you naturally experience color more intensely than non-artists (or sculptors)? Or is it simply a matter of focus?
Gorney:
“I register color not so much in a sentimental way but how some colors that you wouldn’t think would go together actually co-exist in the nature and manmade environments like construction sites, buildings and urban life. It’s not only about the color itself, but what happens to it – how it transforms. I have to admit that the process is the most addictive aspect for me.”
“I’m also affected by the way light passes through color and shapes, which is evident in ‘Subliminal Message.' I guess you can relate to light passing through form if you’re a sculptor.”
SerenaK:
How did you learn to balance control with experimentation? What did you do before (when you were trying to control your colors) that you no longer do now?
Gorney:
“I guess I wouldn’t say I’ve learned to balance control with experimentation, that’s a lifelong process. But what I referred to concerning that balance is a state of mind you try to attain. Control is not about making a pretty or a perfect painting. I think as artists we always aspire to some control to get the results we want but what’s more important to me is spontaneity – getting out of my comfort zone and experiencing something new.”
“I don’t like to intellectualize my work. My process is more improvisational, experiential, like how jazz musicians improvise. How they play notes they wouldn’t expect to hit, breaking through the known world. You have to let go of control to create, to make this happen.”
SerenaK:
I have heard painters say they strive to reproduce a particular color they’ve witnessed…a certain green found in nature, for example. Do you often come across a color you want to bring into your work?
Gorney:
“It’s not so literal for me. I’m not so interested in reproducing color. I like to create it through interaction, combining colors and explore how they go together, how they blend, how they contrast, how they layer. They’re like living components. It reminds me of something Rothko once said, that colors were his performers.”
SerenaK:
What comes first in your paintings? Color or form?
Gorney:
“Color always comes first for me. At a recent studio visit, I was asked about process. I drew an analogy between an artist and a writer. Some writers start with a story and build characters. Others start with a character and build a story around that character. I guess I’m more like the latter. I don’t approach new work with preconceived notions or boundaries. I choose my palette (to me colors are like characters) and tap into a feeling, a mood. Sometimes I begin with a slash or stroke of color. Sometimes I attack the paper or canvas. For me, it’s physical and metaphysical. In the best possible scenario, I’m aware and at the same time I’m in a trance. It’s hard to describe because it’s intuitive, like breathing.”
Artists like Nicke Gorney can make us experience color in ways we never realized. And we can bring that realization into our own world, where we might gain a better appreciation of our own surroundings. I just might start looking for color combinations on construction sites…….
THE SUFFOLK TIMES, Mattituck, NY
PRIMAL IN PAINT by LIZ WOOD
Aspect of Desire, Yellow House and Red Studio 404
« Nicke Gorney, a Montreal –born artist, whose work has been shown in New York City galleries, attaches suggestive titles to her paintings, mixed media and assemblages. Her large-scale work « Wild Streak » sold on opening night at Yellow House. She paints in bold, dramatic narratives, her characters’ are animated brushstrokes’ whose ‘emotional territory’ is richly textured and layered. In her new solo show Red, she describes her series, « Most people would say red is hot. I think it’s deep, a rebellious sort of thing. Painting red is like going out on a limb, painting myself into a corner. »
TRAVELER WATCHMAN, Mattituck, NY
RED TO OPEN AT STUDIO 404 by CAROLYN LEE
« To Gorney, color is poetry in abstract form. It is the eighth wonder of the world. Her show Red opened this past weekend to great success. ‘I’m drawn to the possibilities of certain colors, what happens in the layering process. Red is very difficult to paint because of the value, the range. You have to do a lot to see all the subtleties,’ explained Gorney. ‘When I paint red, I feel emotionally drained. It’s very exposing. There is no place to run, no place to hide. It’s in your face, extremely demanding and it can’t be manipulated because it’s too powerful.’
DAN’S PAPERS
NORTH FORK ARTIST OF THE WEEK:
Painter/Photographer Nicke Gorney by R. B. STUART
“Gorney’s interest in the written word came from her father’s uncle Jay Gorney, the lyricist of ‘Hey Brother Can You Spare a Dime.’ She decided to pursue visual art, exhibiting 16 paintings at the Heckscher Museum of Art and work at Galerie Pelar, the Yellow House and dozens of other shows in and around New York. While she creates large scale abstract paintings, she also incorporates photography. “With photography, I’m a bit of a voyeur, more cinematic. I call one series ‘Still Narratives.’ The spontaneity interests me. I’m totally consumed by it.” Gorney draws inspiration from the abstract expressionists Rothko and de Kooning and photographers Diane Arbus and Cindy Sherman, as well as filmmakers from the ‘70s.”
GALERIES MONTREAL
MONTREAL INSPIRE – NICKE GORNEY
Galerie D
Les tableaux éthérés de l’artiste abstrait Nicke Gorney et les photographies métaphysiques et mythologiques de l’artiste Damian Siqueiros vont orner les grands murs élancés de la nouvelle Galerie D, 1200 rue Amherst, pour sa prochaine exposition « Montréal Inspiré.»
L’exposition sera inaugurée par un vernissage le 21 septembre de 17h à 19h et se poursuivra jusqu’au 30 octobre 2013. Le retour de Gorney en 2010 de New York à Montréal, sa ville natale, l’a inspirée à créer trois séries pour l’exposition : « LIGNE DIVINE » série monochromatique, « MONOCHROME AVEC COULEURS » présentant Futur Antérieur et Métafiction et ‘’ 21ST CENTURY BLUES’’ une MARIAGE ETONNANT de bleus et de verts. Sa palette varie entre couleurs vibrantes et teintes plus sombres qu’elle mélange et dispose en plusieurs couches afin d’empreniez son oeuvre avec une luminosité rayonnante.
« J’équilibre le controle avec l’improvisation de la même façon que les musiciens de jazz improvisent avec les notes de musique, trouvant harmonie et dissonance dans le processus et percant le monde connu pour en créer un nouveau, » explique t-elle.
L’oeuvre de Gorney a été exposée à grande échelle dans des nombreux galeries et musées prestigieux de New York, incluant 16 tableaux au Heckscher Museum of Art, Guild Hall au Hamptons, Galerie Pelar, Studio 404, Matthew Marks, the Thread Waxing Space et le East End Arts Council. En plus de son exposition à la Galerie D, ses œuvres feront partie de ‘’ L’EXPOSITION EN MILIEU DE TRAVAIL,’’ un programme dirigé par la Galerie des Beaux Arts des Amériques et hautement couronné de succès qui stimule la diffusion de l’art dans des entreprises Canadiennes.
FUGUE – ARTS, EXPOSITIONS ET FESTIVALS
NICKE GORNEY AND DAMIAN SIQUEIROS
Du 18 septembre au 1er novembre
Maintenant, on fait place, comme à l’ouverture, à une artiste peintre, Nicke Gorney, et au photographe Damian Siqueiros. En 2010, Gorney délaisse New York pour revenir à Montréal, sa ville natale. Cela inspire chez cet artiste de l’abstraction trois séries de tableaux : Divine Line, Monochrome with color, et 21st Century Blues, une série de bleus et de verts. Sa palette remarquable comprend autant de vibrantes couleurs que des teintes plus sombres mais, appliquées couches par dessus couches, octroient aux œuvres une luminosité qui en irradie… Native de Montréal d’une mère québécoise et d’un père américain, elle part vivre à New York pour revenir à l’adolescence. Elle étudie alors l’histoire de l’art à Concordia. Mais la Grosse Pomme l’appelle et elle part vers New York alors que le milieu artistique de Soho et du East Village se développe avec les Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Cindy Sherman, etc. Elle exposera donc dans plusieurs galeries et musées.
BLOGGER IRENE OGRIZEK
THE ABSTRACTIONS OF NICKE GORNEY
The arguments for and against art are alive again, largely due to the reproductive mechanisms provided by the internet. Why pay for a work of art when an upload of its image does the trick? This is sacrilege to artists, of course, as much as it is to anyone who can appreciate the value of experiencing art on a purely visceral level. But in a country seeing an upsurge of fiscal misconduct on one hand, and arbitrary budget cuts on the other, how can we justify expenditures on art? What can art do for us?
Nicke Gorney is a Montreal and New York artist who has spent most of the last 30 years living and working in New York City. Her show at Galerie D opened last week and I was invited down to take a look.
Gorney’s painting are abstract, lush and challenging. They ask us to take another look at the world and do so through the artist’s investigations of colour.
Abstract art, generally speaking, does not have a goal. According the Josee Bélisle, curator at Montreal’s Museum of Contemporary Art, abstraction is often defined in terms of what it is not: the absence of figurations, the intention not to refer to the real world, a lack of specific guidelines for interpretation, the elimination of all anecdotal content.
Despite these absences, abstraction is still a powerful art form: it brings us to a higher awareness of our responses to all things visual; it makes us think about thinking and it does so through our own eyes.
Gorney’s paintings, in her layerings of oil, gouache and acrylic bring to mind that interplay of scale. It’s a process that invites close inspection, an inspection that causes us to wonder also, why her colour palette stirs us and why her patterns of horizontal and vertical lines, rendered in deep and lightly textured brushstrokes, emerge so naturally.
Do these colours and patterns speak to a deeper shared reality? Do we really, as many pop theorists like to say, have hive minds that fall back on default patterns, thoughts and beliefs about reality? It’s a question raised by Gorney, albeit one I suspect emerges indirectly and in analog, just as visual memories often do.
It’s art like Gorney’s — art without echoes of configured reality — that puts our usual way of seeing on pause. Through her abstractions she brings our perception back to the level of pure colour. These are paintings that slow us down, stop us from seeing the world in blur, if only momentarily, and remind us of the primal importance and pleasure of perceiving.
WHERE ARE THE SHOWS
Montreal Inspired
Categories: Art & Galleries
MONTRÉAL INSPIRED
OPENS AT GALERIE D
August 16, 2013 – The ethereal paintings of abstract artist Nicke Gorney and the metaphysical and mythological photography of Damian Siqueiros will grace the soaring walls of the new Amherst Street Galerie D for their upcoming show “Montréal Inspired.” The show opens with a vernissage on September 21st from 17 h – 19h and runs through October 18, 2013.
“I balance control with improvisation the way jazz musicians hit notes unexpectedly, find harmony and dissonance in the process, and break through the known world to create a new one,” she explained.
Gorney’s work has been widely exhibited in galleries and museums throughout New York.
Her exhibitions include Guild Hall in the Hamptons, Galerie Pelar, Studio 404, Matthew Marks, the Thread Waxing Space and the East End Arts Council, among others. In addition to her show at Galérie D, her work will be included in Exhibition in the Workplace, a highly successful program that introduces art into the corporate culture by Montréal gallery Beaux Arts des Amériques.
ELAN
Exhibition: Montreal Inspired
Gorney’s return from New York to her native Montréal inspired three series for the exhibition: her monochromatic series Divine Line, her collection of Monochrome with Color featuring Futur Antérieur and Metafiction and 21st Century Blues, a transcendent collection of blues and greens. Her remarkable palette ranges from vibrant color to somber hues, which she blends and layers to achieve radiant luminosity in her work.
Gorney’s work has been widely exhibited throughout New York, Massachusetts, Montreal and Toronto.
THE MAIN
Starting Sunday, indulge in an aesthetic love affair with Montreal at the new exhibit at Amherst Street Gallery D. Entitled “Montreal Inspired,” artists Nicke Gorney and Damian Siqueiros pay homage through colour-rich abstract paintings and multi-level mythical photography, respectively.
By Sara B-G
THE SIXTH BOROUGH
Anthony Giordano Gallery
The Anthony Giordano Gallery at Dowling College presents The Sixth Borough, a group exhibition curated by artist, Kathy Kennedy. This show features two and three dimensional works by Long Island artists Steven Ceraso, Nicke Gorney, Sylvia Harnick, Edward Joseph, Robert Mielenhausen, Evelyn Ramos, Claire Watson, and Marianne Weil.
The artists in this exhibition draw on universal themes of architecture, landscape, abstraction and the figure. These artists employ techniques of painting and printing, collage, ready-made assemblage, bronze cast and wood carving. Though diverse in material and process these individual artists are inherently connected by thought and the use of the abstracted image.
“Ms. Gorney's paintings are chromatic abstractions inspired by diffused light. In works like ''Peep Show'' and ''Encounter,'' fleeting references can be identified, but in her more recent paintings, Ms. Gorney is preoccupied with the emotional dimensions of color. Atmosphere is still paramount; however, her tones are translucent and interactive, as in ''Seeing Red,'' with its rolling clouds of color.”
BRYANT NEWS New York, NY
“Artist Nicke Gorney finds poetry not only in the meaning of words but in the curve described by a stroke of paint or the depth of emotion embodied in color. As an abstract painter, she works in veils of color and gesture, mixing oil, gouache and acrylics to create lush surfaces that shimmer in subtle rhythms. Building up her work through many layers, she invites the viewer into its depths.”
ARTFUL VAGABOND
How to be a Slave to Color - Day 339
Color is the reason artists become painters rather than sculptors. Painters can name the particular shade of blue of the sky on a certain day. They know how to create depth, not strictly through form, but through layering and transparency of color. It’s a wild, sensuous world that painters can bring to those who are willing to take the time to experience it.
Color is what made Nicke Gorney want to be an artist in the first place. “In the beginning I wanted to control color but now I am a slave to it,” she says. Through painting, mixed media and photography, Gorney explores light passing through color in infinite variations as she works to capture an ethereal quality through the balance of technique and improvisation. “It’s all about balancing control with experimentation,” says the artist. “I have to admit that it’s far more engaging to travel through my work than to try and manipulate it. Even though I’m more conscious of the process, in many ways the outcome is unpredictable. I might set out with a specific intention in mind but I lose myself in the mystery behind it. When I’m in the moment, something remarkable happens.”
I wanted to know more about this artist who admits being a slave to color.
SerenaK:
Were you always so intensely focused on color, or did that develop and strengthen over time?
Gorney:
“I would say I was seduced by color and how it drew me in – but my sense of color did develop and strengthen over time. I’m also obsessed with luminosity. Whenever I would go to museums and galleries and see luminous paintings that were mesmerizing, I kept asking myself, ‘How did they achieve that?’”
“My intense focus on color began with my color field paintings such as, “21st Century Blues No. 5″ (above), which was part of a series of sixteen paintings I did during that period. Then I gravitated to more monochromatic work while at the same time I was moving into photography with a series of abstract photographs called BlackPrints. I blended the two mediums and created a series called Photo Rehabs.”
“Eventually I drifted back into what I would call monochrome with color, as in ‘Meta Fiction’ (below). It’s like the difference between black & white and color film from the standpoint of cinema or still photography. I love the mood, the light…the ambiance and drama of black & white, like in those films of the sixties and seventies. Actually, if you think about it, monochrome is a color or shades of a color so why make a distinction?”
SerenaK:
Do you think you naturally experience color more intensely than non-artists (or sculptors)? Or is it simply a matter of focus?
Gorney:
“I register color not so much in a sentimental way but how some colors that you wouldn’t think would go together actually co-exist in the nature and manmade environments like construction sites, buildings and urban life. It’s not only about the color itself, but what happens to it – how it transforms. I have to admit that the process is the most addictive aspect for me.”
“I’m also affected by the way light passes through color and shapes, which is evident in ‘Subliminal Message.' I guess you can relate to light passing through form if you’re a sculptor.”
SerenaK:
How did you learn to balance control with experimentation? What did you do before (when you were trying to control your colors) that you no longer do now?
Gorney:
“I guess I wouldn’t say I’ve learned to balance control with experimentation, that’s a lifelong process. But what I referred to concerning that balance is a state of mind you try to attain. Control is not about making a pretty or a perfect painting. I think as artists we always aspire to some control to get the results we want but what’s more important to me is spontaneity – getting out of my comfort zone and experiencing something new.”
“I don’t like to intellectualize my work. My process is more improvisational, experiential, like how jazz musicians improvise. How they play notes they wouldn’t expect to hit, breaking through the known world. You have to let go of control to create, to make this happen.”
SerenaK:
I have heard painters say they strive to reproduce a particular color they’ve witnessed…a certain green found in nature, for example. Do you often come across a color you want to bring into your work?
Gorney:
“It’s not so literal for me. I’m not so interested in reproducing color. I like to create it through interaction, combining colors and explore how they go together, how they blend, how they contrast, how they layer. They’re like living components. It reminds me of something Rothko once said, that colors were his performers.”
SerenaK:
What comes first in your paintings? Color or form?
Gorney:
“Color always comes first for me. At a recent studio visit, I was asked about process. I drew an analogy between an artist and a writer. Some writers start with a story and build characters. Others start with a character and build a story around that character. I guess I’m more like the latter. I don’t approach new work with preconceived notions or boundaries. I choose my palette (to me colors are like characters) and tap into a feeling, a mood. Sometimes I begin with a slash or stroke of color. Sometimes I attack the paper or canvas. For me, it’s physical and metaphysical. In the best possible scenario, I’m aware and at the same time I’m in a trance. It’s hard to describe because it’s intuitive, like breathing.”
Artists like Nicke Gorney can make us experience color in ways we never realized. And we can bring that realization into our own world, where we might gain a better appreciation of our own surroundings. I just might start looking for color combinations on construction sites…….
THE SUFFOLK TIMES, Mattituck, NY
PRIMAL IN PAINT by LIZ WOOD
Aspect of Desire, Yellow House and Red Studio 404
« Nicke Gorney, a Montreal –born artist, whose work has been shown in New York City galleries, attaches suggestive titles to her paintings, mixed media and assemblages. Her large-scale work « Wild Streak » sold on opening night at Yellow House. She paints in bold, dramatic narratives, her characters’ are animated brushstrokes’ whose ‘emotional territory’ is richly textured and layered. In her new solo show Red, she describes her series, « Most people would say red is hot. I think it’s deep, a rebellious sort of thing. Painting red is like going out on a limb, painting myself into a corner. »
TRAVELER WATCHMAN, Mattituck, NY
RED TO OPEN AT STUDIO 404 by CAROLYN LEE
« To Gorney, color is poetry in abstract form. It is the eighth wonder of the world. Her show Red opened this past weekend to great success. ‘I’m drawn to the possibilities of certain colors, what happens in the layering process. Red is very difficult to paint because of the value, the range. You have to do a lot to see all the subtleties,’ explained Gorney. ‘When I paint red, I feel emotionally drained. It’s very exposing. There is no place to run, no place to hide. It’s in your face, extremely demanding and it can’t be manipulated because it’s too powerful.’
DAN’S PAPERS
NORTH FORK ARTIST OF THE WEEK:
Painter/Photographer Nicke Gorney by R. B. STUART
“Gorney’s interest in the written word came from her father’s uncle Jay Gorney, the lyricist of ‘Hey Brother Can You Spare a Dime.’ She decided to pursue visual art, exhibiting 16 paintings at the Heckscher Museum of Art and work at Galerie Pelar, the Yellow House and dozens of other shows in and around New York. While she creates large scale abstract paintings, she also incorporates photography. “With photography, I’m a bit of a voyeur, more cinematic. I call one series ‘Still Narratives.’ The spontaneity interests me. I’m totally consumed by it.” Gorney draws inspiration from the abstract expressionists Rothko and de Kooning and photographers Diane Arbus and Cindy Sherman, as well as filmmakers from the ‘70s.”
GALERIES MONTREAL
MONTREAL INSPIRE – NICKE GORNEY
Galerie D
Les tableaux éthérés de l’artiste abstrait Nicke Gorney et les photographies métaphysiques et mythologiques de l’artiste Damian Siqueiros vont orner les grands murs élancés de la nouvelle Galerie D, 1200 rue Amherst, pour sa prochaine exposition « Montréal Inspiré.»
L’exposition sera inaugurée par un vernissage le 21 septembre de 17h à 19h et se poursuivra jusqu’au 30 octobre 2013. Le retour de Gorney en 2010 de New York à Montréal, sa ville natale, l’a inspirée à créer trois séries pour l’exposition : « LIGNE DIVINE » série monochromatique, « MONOCHROME AVEC COULEURS » présentant Futur Antérieur et Métafiction et ‘’ 21ST CENTURY BLUES’’ une MARIAGE ETONNANT de bleus et de verts. Sa palette varie entre couleurs vibrantes et teintes plus sombres qu’elle mélange et dispose en plusieurs couches afin d’empreniez son oeuvre avec une luminosité rayonnante.
« J’équilibre le controle avec l’improvisation de la même façon que les musiciens de jazz improvisent avec les notes de musique, trouvant harmonie et dissonance dans le processus et percant le monde connu pour en créer un nouveau, » explique t-elle.
L’oeuvre de Gorney a été exposée à grande échelle dans des nombreux galeries et musées prestigieux de New York, incluant 16 tableaux au Heckscher Museum of Art, Guild Hall au Hamptons, Galerie Pelar, Studio 404, Matthew Marks, the Thread Waxing Space et le East End Arts Council. En plus de son exposition à la Galerie D, ses œuvres feront partie de ‘’ L’EXPOSITION EN MILIEU DE TRAVAIL,’’ un programme dirigé par la Galerie des Beaux Arts des Amériques et hautement couronné de succès qui stimule la diffusion de l’art dans des entreprises Canadiennes.
FUGUE – ARTS, EXPOSITIONS ET FESTIVALS
NICKE GORNEY AND DAMIAN SIQUEIROS
Du 18 septembre au 1er novembre
Maintenant, on fait place, comme à l’ouverture, à une artiste peintre, Nicke Gorney, et au photographe Damian Siqueiros. En 2010, Gorney délaisse New York pour revenir à Montréal, sa ville natale. Cela inspire chez cet artiste de l’abstraction trois séries de tableaux : Divine Line, Monochrome with color, et 21st Century Blues, une série de bleus et de verts. Sa palette remarquable comprend autant de vibrantes couleurs que des teintes plus sombres mais, appliquées couches par dessus couches, octroient aux œuvres une luminosité qui en irradie… Native de Montréal d’une mère québécoise et d’un père américain, elle part vivre à New York pour revenir à l’adolescence. Elle étudie alors l’histoire de l’art à Concordia. Mais la Grosse Pomme l’appelle et elle part vers New York alors que le milieu artistique de Soho et du East Village se développe avec les Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Cindy Sherman, etc. Elle exposera donc dans plusieurs galeries et musées.
BLOGGER IRENE OGRIZEK
THE ABSTRACTIONS OF NICKE GORNEY
The arguments for and against art are alive again, largely due to the reproductive mechanisms provided by the internet. Why pay for a work of art when an upload of its image does the trick? This is sacrilege to artists, of course, as much as it is to anyone who can appreciate the value of experiencing art on a purely visceral level. But in a country seeing an upsurge of fiscal misconduct on one hand, and arbitrary budget cuts on the other, how can we justify expenditures on art? What can art do for us?
Nicke Gorney is a Montreal and New York artist who has spent most of the last 30 years living and working in New York City. Her show at Galerie D opened last week and I was invited down to take a look.
Gorney’s painting are abstract, lush and challenging. They ask us to take another look at the world and do so through the artist’s investigations of colour.
Abstract art, generally speaking, does not have a goal. According the Josee Bélisle, curator at Montreal’s Museum of Contemporary Art, abstraction is often defined in terms of what it is not: the absence of figurations, the intention not to refer to the real world, a lack of specific guidelines for interpretation, the elimination of all anecdotal content.
Despite these absences, abstraction is still a powerful art form: it brings us to a higher awareness of our responses to all things visual; it makes us think about thinking and it does so through our own eyes.
Gorney’s paintings, in her layerings of oil, gouache and acrylic bring to mind that interplay of scale. It’s a process that invites close inspection, an inspection that causes us to wonder also, why her colour palette stirs us and why her patterns of horizontal and vertical lines, rendered in deep and lightly textured brushstrokes, emerge so naturally.
Do these colours and patterns speak to a deeper shared reality? Do we really, as many pop theorists like to say, have hive minds that fall back on default patterns, thoughts and beliefs about reality? It’s a question raised by Gorney, albeit one I suspect emerges indirectly and in analog, just as visual memories often do.
It’s art like Gorney’s — art without echoes of configured reality — that puts our usual way of seeing on pause. Through her abstractions she brings our perception back to the level of pure colour. These are paintings that slow us down, stop us from seeing the world in blur, if only momentarily, and remind us of the primal importance and pleasure of perceiving.
WHERE ARE THE SHOWS
Montreal Inspired
Categories: Art & Galleries
MONTRÉAL INSPIRED
OPENS AT GALERIE D
August 16, 2013 – The ethereal paintings of abstract artist Nicke Gorney and the metaphysical and mythological photography of Damian Siqueiros will grace the soaring walls of the new Amherst Street Galerie D for their upcoming show “Montréal Inspired.” The show opens with a vernissage on September 21st from 17 h – 19h and runs through October 18, 2013.
“I balance control with improvisation the way jazz musicians hit notes unexpectedly, find harmony and dissonance in the process, and break through the known world to create a new one,” she explained.
Gorney’s work has been widely exhibited in galleries and museums throughout New York.
Her exhibitions include Guild Hall in the Hamptons, Galerie Pelar, Studio 404, Matthew Marks, the Thread Waxing Space and the East End Arts Council, among others. In addition to her show at Galérie D, her work will be included in Exhibition in the Workplace, a highly successful program that introduces art into the corporate culture by Montréal gallery Beaux Arts des Amériques.
ELAN
Exhibition: Montreal Inspired
Gorney’s return from New York to her native Montréal inspired three series for the exhibition: her monochromatic series Divine Line, her collection of Monochrome with Color featuring Futur Antérieur and Metafiction and 21st Century Blues, a transcendent collection of blues and greens. Her remarkable palette ranges from vibrant color to somber hues, which she blends and layers to achieve radiant luminosity in her work.
Gorney’s work has been widely exhibited throughout New York, Massachusetts, Montreal and Toronto.
THE MAIN
Starting Sunday, indulge in an aesthetic love affair with Montreal at the new exhibit at Amherst Street Gallery D. Entitled “Montreal Inspired,” artists Nicke Gorney and Damian Siqueiros pay homage through colour-rich abstract paintings and multi-level mythical photography, respectively.
By Sara B-G
THE SIXTH BOROUGH
Anthony Giordano Gallery
The Anthony Giordano Gallery at Dowling College presents The Sixth Borough, a group exhibition curated by artist, Kathy Kennedy. This show features two and three dimensional works by Long Island artists Steven Ceraso, Nicke Gorney, Sylvia Harnick, Edward Joseph, Robert Mielenhausen, Evelyn Ramos, Claire Watson, and Marianne Weil.
The artists in this exhibition draw on universal themes of architecture, landscape, abstraction and the figure. These artists employ techniques of painting and printing, collage, ready-made assemblage, bronze cast and wood carving. Though diverse in material and process these individual artists are inherently connected by thought and the use of the abstracted image.
