David Richard Gallery | News

October 16, 2018
Press Release - Matthew Kluber 'No Place Like Utopia'
News

MATTHEW KLUBER
No Place Like Utopia 


October 19 - November 18, 2018 
Opening Reception: Sunday, October 21, 2018, 3:00 - 7:00 PM


David Richard Gallery, LLC 
211 East 121 ST | New York, NY 10035
P: (212) 882-1705
www.davidrichardgallery.com



David Richard Gallery is pleased to announce No Place Like Utopia, Matthew Kluber’s third solo exhibition with the Gallery and his first solo exhibition in New York. The presentation will include new and recent paintings, opening October 19, 2018 with an artist reception on Sunday, October 21, 2018 3:00 - 7:00 PM at the gallery’s ground floor exhibition space in East Harlem at 211 East 121 ST, New York, New York 10025. The exhibition will remain on view through November 18, 2018.

The slow-moving paintings of Matthew Kluber are hybrids, realized at the interface of two very differ media comprised of a bold geometric painting on an aluminum support and a unique digital projection onto that support. The digital imagery is generated from Kluber’s own computer programs that allow him to generate many layers of imagery and encode variables that make subtle shifts and changes in the speed, direction, duration and length of various segments while maintaining the controlled program, compositional elements and color palettes. The result is a hypnotic, kinetic and perceptual experience that never ends, slowly evolving and morphing from one image to the next. The projection is not a video nor a repeating loop, it is continuously generated directly from Kluber’s custom software. Another great feature of this work is that when the projection is switched off via remote control, then a stunning geometric painting remains prominently on the wall. In addition to two new projections and custom imagery, Kluber is debuting a new larger format measuring five feet tall by 10 feet wide.

Kluber’s work reads like a compression of post-1960s abstraction. References include color theory and Color Field painting with early influences of Kenneth Noland, Morris Louis and Gene Davis and their use of subtractive color. There are clearly references to the Light and Space movement with inspiration from the transformational work of Robert Irwin, James Turrell and Dan Flavin and their exploration of additive color from diverse light sources. Together, the two historical movements noted above also echo an important feature of art that emerged during the 1960s and 70s – a combination of traditional artmaking (canvas and pigment) with technology (electricity, light and new materials as supports) as well as new concepts of what constitutes art (transforming a space with light). Kluber also references the intense exploration of visual perception and optical art with the trippy patterns and migrations of forms and color across his paintings like a light show. 


About Matthew Kluber:

Kluber received his BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and his MFA from the University of Iowa. His thirty-year career has seen his work exhibited in galleries and museums from New York to Shanghai. His work can be found in public and private collections including The Austin Museum of Art, the Des Moines Art Center, the Portland Art Museum, the Figge Art Museum and the Thoma Art Foundation in Chicago, among others.


About David Richard Gallery:

Since its inception in 2010, David Richard Gallery has produced museum quality exhibitions that feature Post War abstraction in the US. The presentations have addressed specific decades and geographies as well as certain movements and tendencies. While the gallery has long been recognized as an important proponent of post-1960s abstraction—including both the influential pioneers as well as a younger generation of practitioners in this field— in keeping with this spirit of nurture and development the gallery also presents established and very new artists who embrace more gestural and representational approaches to the making of art as well as young emerging artists.

In 2015 David Richard Gallery launched DR Projects to provide a platform for artists of all stripes—international, national, local, emerging and established—to present special solo projects or to participate in unique collaborations or thematic exhibitions. The goal is to offer a fresh look at contemporary art practice from a broad spectrum of artists and presentations. The Gallery opened a second location in New York in 2017. 

Associated Artist

Associated Exhibitions

Associated News

News Archive


May 30, 2024
January 28, 2024
November 27, 2023
May 24, 2022
February 23, 2022
July 20, 2021
May 11, 2021
November 16, 2020
March 27, 2019
March 16, 2019
July 1, 2017
July 1, 2017
July 1, 2017
July 1, 2017
January 17, 2017
Globalocation: Celebrating 20 Years of Artnauts
J. Willard Marriott Library
The University of Utah, 01/17/2017

The University of Utah’s J. Willard Marriott Library will host the art exhibition Globalocation: Celebrating 20 Years of Artnauts, Jan. 20-March 3.

Artnauts, an art collective formed 20 years ago by George Rivera, professor of art and art history at the University of Colorado, Boulder, consists of 300 global artists who serve as goodwill ambassadors, acknowledging and supporting victims of oppression worldwide. Their creativity has generated over 230 exhibitions across five continents. Five faculty members from the U’s Department of Art and Art History are members of the collective, Sandy Brunvand, Beth Krensky, V. Kim Martinez, Brian Snapp and Xi Zhang.

Globalocation derives from “Globalocational Art” — a concept used by the Artnauts to refer to their exhibitions in international venues. It is the mission of the Artnauts to take art to places of contention, and this anniversary exhibition is a sample of places where they have been and themes they have addressed.

“The Artnauts could not exist without the commitment of the artists in the collective to a common vision of the transformative power of art,” said Rivera. “The Artnauts make their contribution with art that hopefully generates a dialogue with an international community on subjects that are sometimes difficult to raise.”

Krensky, associate department chair of the Art and Art History Department, had the opportunity to travel with Rivera in Chile as part of an Artnauts project, working with mothers who were searching for their children who had mysteriously disappeared during a time of political unrest.

“When I travelled to Chile in 1998, George and I spent an afternoon with the Mothers of the Disappeared, and the meeting changed my life,” said Krensky. “It was from that moment on that I placed a picture of them on my desk to look at every day. I was so moved by what they each had lost — a son, a brother, a father — and yet what remained for them was a deep, deep well of love. They were fierce warriors and stood up to the government to demand the whereabouts and information of the people who had disappeared, but they lived within profound love.”

The 20th anniversary exhibition at the Marriott Library is a retrospective of the traveling works the Artnauts have toured around the globe. The exhibition will be located on level three of the library. The opening reception is open to the public and will be held on Friday, Jan 20, 4-6 p.m. Rivera will speak at 4 p.m.

September 12, 2014
February 15, 2014
January 31, 2014
September 12, 2013
December 18, 2012
September 26, 2012
May 31, 2012
September 21, 2011