SCOTT SPEH GALLERY
Gallery
Address:
845 W Washington Blvd.
2nd Floor
Chicago, IL 60607
312.480.8390
send
email
( scott at westernexhibitions dot com )
Gallery hours:
Wedensdays thru Saturdays
11am to 6pm
April 3 to May 30, 2009
In Gallery 1
GEOFFREY TODD SMITH
Geoffrey Todd Smith is a Friend to Beauty!
info | imagesIn Gallery 2
GEOFFREY TODD SMITH
I Could Look at Myself in Your Eyes Forever
info | imagespress: NewCity | Flavorpill | Chicagoist | Huffington Post | Cool Hunting | Chicago Art Review | FecalFace | Orange Alert
Western Exhibitions will open two new shows by Geoffrey Todd Smith on Friday, April 3 with a public reception from 5 to 8pm.
Geoffrey Todd Smith relentlessly (and patiently) seeks to discover beauty in his abstract painting/drawing hybrids amid the ceaseless interruptions and distractions of daily life. Using a limited vocabulary, he delineates a seemingly impenetrable field of optical buzz and hiss. Beginning with a grid of painted dots, he adorns his color fields in a “horror vaccui” fizz of zigzags while directing the viewer through densely hand-drawn patterns and painted elements that optically mix and integrate colors. In each of Smith’s works, small painted dots and ellipses become embedded in the structure of a grid or interfere with it, depending on absorption or reflection of light, while also reinforcing the rhythm and direction of the zigzags.
Smith has formatted the titles of the works in this show in the style of status updates on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter, social networking sites that encourage users to provide indications of their current mood, predicament or condition. Each title reflects a self-involved, momentary declaration of Smith’s frame of mind while making said work, rather than hinting at any sort of narrative in the work. The titles present a range of emotions including comical (LOL), excessively personal (TMI), vulgar (OMG) and absurd (WTF!?), reinforcing the spirit in which each work is made and placing them deeper within the context of the moment in which they were produced. Examples include: “Geoffrey Todd Smith is Turned on, Logged in and Burned Out”; “Geoffrey Todd Smith is the Commander of Hugs and Kisses”; “Geoffrey Todd Smith is a Slave to Beauty” and “Geoffrey Todd Smith is Untitled”.
Geoffrey Todd Smith has shown recently at Seminal Projects in San Diego, Main Gallery in Las Vegas, Fecal Face Dot Gallery in San Francisco, the Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago and The Northern Illinois Art Museum in DeKalb and has been called one of the "rising stars we should be collecting now" by Chicago Magazine. His work is in the collections of Hallmark Inc. in Kansas City, the Jager Collection in Amsterdam, the South Bend Regional Art Museum in Indiana and Harper College in Illinois. Geoffrey Todd Smith lives and works in and around the Chicagoland area.
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