Russell Tyler

July 11 to August 22, 2020

Galerie Nicolas Robert is pleased to present a new series of work by Brooklyn based artist Russell Tyler. Through his recent work, he explores methodically distinct formal variations in his paintings, from gestural abstractions to spacey landscapes. Russell Tyler paints from memory and, as such, these works approximate not just physical but psychological landscapes, also. They reconstruct their mountains, their horizons and hues, but so too do they sketch the fine edges of an atmosphere, an energy, an affect. And, as is evidenced by his paintings, the atmosphere is one of poise, of equilibrium. Always, shapes and shadows are daintily balanced against one another, as if bubbles pressed cheek to cheek before popping themselves out of existence. 

There is an anachronistic tinge to Tyler’s paintings, a retrofuturist quality to his palette and insistent outlines that reverberates with the graphic language of 1970s science fiction. But the comparison is not solely aesthetic. In contrast to much contemporary sci-fi, there was a belief amongst early adopters of the genre that a social utopia was, if not probable, then possible. Moreover, the collective salvation of mankind often necessitated a reconnection with, a reinvestment in, the natural world; a process of spiritual rediscovery that Tyler’s paintings seem to document. This is work that knows both isolation and connection, both loneliness and life.

Russell Tyler (b. 1981, Summertown, TN) received his MFA from Pratt Institute (Brooklyn) and his BFA from Concordia University (Montreal). Previous solo exhibitions include The Hole (New York), Andersen’s Contemporary (Copenhagen), Richard Heller (Los Angeles), Ribordy Contemporary (Geneva), Galerie Bernard Ceysson (Paris), among others. Tyler has been included in group exhibitions at institutions and galleries including Savannah College of Art and Design, the Torrance Art Museum, New Britain Museum of American Art, Anonymous Gallery, Retrospective Gallery, among others. Reviews and features on his work have been written in Artforum, Hyperallergic, Modern Painters, T: The New York Times Style Magazine, NY Arts Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail and Le Monde