Spite Unseen
11 March – 21 May 2022
We are happy to present the third solo show of the artist Chloe Wise at the gallery. The exhibition presents a series of intimate colourful portraits and still-lives.
The third decade of the 21st century has begun. Civilisation is faltering, life seeping from a hundred undressed wounds. Hope and promise rock and totter, smothered in trembling clouds of avarice. Nature promises healing, but decay is everywhere. Man has made the world, and it has been cursed by god.
Still, somewhere, pleasure gardens glow and sparkle, glazed in wan digital twilight, filled with the garish clatter of empty words. Quiet laughter, hidden tears, intoxicated feelings, all echo through the long shadowed night. And then, there, a whispered invitation offers a dark amusement. It is C.
Chloe Wise, Optimistic Littering, 2022
She has long dark hair, olive skin and emerald eyes that don’t smile often but when they do make you catch your breath. Glance at C and she is watching you. Her aura promises the comfort of complete control. Do you want it? Zipped up in black leather armor, D has eyes alert with alarm. Her hair is wild, her beauty edged with the dream of a hashish eater. Even in this closeted space her im- pulses can’t be trusted. She senses that trouble is co- ming. She would go, but wants to stay.
In the glowing dark towers a powerful figure, mod and raven haired, two silver rings in one ear. Her name is S and she has something to do. It’s bad and she likes the idea. But first, oysters. Plump and briny, they only add to the perverse joy of observing A when she is quite unaware.
Chloe Wise, Be able not to be able, 2022
Poor A. For her, inside and outside is a blurred line. The golden arabesque of her silky mane sets off gray eyes that look but do not see. Her wants remains amorphous, to herself and others. She likes not knowing. It’s one of her favorite feelings. One is apart. Older, wise as a shaman, she measures the scene like a puppet master. Is she hungry or sated? Should she cast her spell or hold back? What she does matters most of all. She hasn’t decided.
Then there’s B, the baby. Ruby-lipped, crimson tressed, she is not docile but likes submission, longing to be incautious, overwhelmed. For her, capitulation means control. She sports an elaborate satin ruff – what does it hide? D knows but doesn’t care. Moonlight through dirty glass shows a somber face toned by the sun. Her hair is bound tight but her racing thoughts rage without control. The world is her mirror.
A warmth hangs in the air. How did they find each other? Are they together or apart? Monads in a philosophical equation whose logic remains indeterminate, their world has shrunk down to the quatrefoil size of the human heart. The valves pump, the red blood cells flow, in the relentless exchange of longing and loss.
— Walter Robinson, New York, Feb. 26, 2022
2021
Oil on canvas
122 × 91.5 cm / 48 × 36 in.