Timothy Taylor Gallery‘s current exhibition, Fiona Rae: New Paintings, doesn’t need much explaining, but the works comprising Rae’s third solo show at the gallery do bear closer inspection – especially the Where’s Wally-style game she seems to be playing with the pop-up pandas that are surreptitiously dotted around the large canvases of the 2012 project.
Rae bought a string of oriental embroidered pandas and was intrigued by the effect the stitching has on the look and the expression of the little animals – “both ludicrous and ominous” she says. That small discovery in New York gave Rae an excuse to paint, something she says is not always easy to come by. A selection of the resulting work is what you see here; large-scale canvases with an eastern look, both inspired by and containing variations of the same little pandas. Rae likes to subvert the usual rules of style and composition, and has previous form for adding graphics, symbols and cartoons into otherwise more “painterly” paintings; here the expected jarring collision is actually an enjoyably seamless meld. On show at the London venue until 23rd February.
Installation View
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘Something is about to happen!’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 69 in. / 213.4 x 175.3 cm
T008680
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘I need gentle conversations’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 69 in. / 213.4 x 175.3 cm
T008739
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘The sun throws my sorrow away’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 69 in. / 213.4 x 175.3 cm
T008681
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Installation View
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘I always wish you every happiness with my whole heart in the distance’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 69 in. / 213.4 x 175.3 cm
T008740
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘Solitary stroll’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
24 x 19 1/2 in. / 61 x 49.5 cm
T008731
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Fiona Rae
‘Present party for you’, 2012
Oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 69 in. / 213.4 x 175.3 cm
T008679
© Fiona Rae; Courtesy,
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
