Wendell Gladstone

The Kravets/Wehby Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of Simple Machines, a solo exhibition featuring new works by Wendell Gladstone, opening on Thursday, September 4th, and running through October 11th 2014.

In his most recent body of work, Wendell Gladstone meditates on power structures and the architecture that defines their hierarchies. A chaotic mix of disjointed figures, brightly hued wooden apparatuses, opaque and transparent layers of color, and meandering wire structures are combined to depict fragments of stories that can’t be entirely known.

Gladstone’s compositions are dense and turbulent, while simultaneously having rhythm and order. Formal shifts in scale, color, transparency, and texture act to blur focal points and create multiplicity. Separate tangents and dialogues arise wherever the viewer’s eye happens to land, only to give way and shift again when taking in the whole composition. Diverse sources that range from Greek mythology to tribal masks of Papua New Guinea and vernacular of European fisherman’s homes further obfuscate meaning. A polymorphic language is spoken within the paintings, hinting that an underlying intent exists.

Wendell Gladstone is a painter based in Los Angeles, California. In 2010 A catalog was published of Gladstone’s work by Zero+ Publishing called D.O.A., S.O.S., ETC. H has had a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary art San Diego and His work has been featured in group exhibitions at the Kemper Museum, Kansas City, the Torrence Art Museum, and The San Antonio Museum of Art. Recently his work is has been featured at the Nassau County Museum of Art in New York. His work has received acclaim in publications such as New York Magazine, Artslant, The Las Angeles Times, The Village Voice, Artforum, and the New York Times.