August 23, 2023 (Palo Alto, CA) – Qualia Contemporary Art is pleased to present Three Directions, a solo show of paintings by Nathan Randall Green. The exhibition continues Green’s visual exploration of the cosmos and its extraordinary immensity. The vibrant, geometric paintings are created on organic shapes full of surface texture, and they speak to Green’s desire to measure, map, and chart our physical world with precise geometric lines, creating a sense of both compression and expansion. Green aims to impart a sense of expansive wonder and awe into his work. Nathan Randall Green: Three Directions will be open to the public from September 13 – October 20, 2023, with an opening celebration hosted on September 16th from 4:30-6:30 PM PST.
The exhibition’s title, Three Directions, is a reference to the artist’s conceptual practice of looking out, up, and down. He attempts to look outside of himself with an objective eye, then up to the grandeur of the cosmos, and then finally back down to the earth and his life. This process mirrors artmaking, which requires this constant shift in perspective, culminating in the job of looking down at the artwork in the act of creation. Three Directions also alludes to the trinity of the past, present, and future and their relative relationships when stargazing.
Green’s Three Directions embraces symbolism to consider the scale and length of the universe, beginning with the Big Bang. Green uses radial forms that stand in for the sun — and the trillions of other stars like it. His process is intuitive; he naturally gravitates towards a fixed set of shapes or characters, including solar symbols, crescent shapes, and sunburst patterns, and rearranges them to create alternative views of our universe. Informed by a background in printmaking, particularly woodblock and serigraphy, Green paints in layers. His work often mimics geologic strata and the layers of Earth beneath our feet and frequently attempts to depict the passage of time within the single frame of his painting.
The artist has long been building his own painting surfaces that he shapes into amorphous, organic forms. He applies a mixture of paper pulp and gesso to the canvas to create an irregular, textured surface onto which he applies flat, graphic diagrammatical imagery. The work builds on his past practice, which has been slowly evolving over 15 years. His paintings are an idiosyncratic act of measuring, mapping, and making sense of our universe and its immensity. In creating the work, Green hopes to imbue in others the same awestruck delight of contemplating the vastness of the world which we inhabit.
About Nathan Randall Green
Nathan Randall Green (b. in Houston, TX) received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2004 from the University of Texas at Austin, TX. He is a founding member and partner of Okay Mountain Gallery and Collective in Austin, TX and was a Curator of Education at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. He currently lives and works in The Bronx, NY.
Green has exhibited widely nationally and internationally including exhibitions at Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston, TX; Austin Museum of Art, Austin, TX; Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX; The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX; Salisbury University Art Galleries, Salisbury, MD; Montserrat College of Art, Beverly, MA; University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY; New Mexico State University Art Museum, Las Cruces, NM; among many others. His most recent solo and two-person exhibitions include Bale Creek Allen Gallery, Fort Worth, TX; Walter Storms Gallery, Munich, Germany; Morgan Lehman Gallery, New York, NY; Goss-Michael Foundation, Dallas, TX; Art Palace, Houston, TX; Sointula Art Shed, Canada; and more. He exhibited in the 2011 Texas Biennial in Austin, TX and SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York, NY in 2020.
Green has participated in artist residencies in Connecticut, New York, Vermont, Illinois, and Texas. He has given several lectures nationally including at Montserrat College of Art, Beverly, MA; Texas A&M University-Commerce, Commerce, TX; New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM; Salisbury University, Salisbury, MD; University of Montana, Missoula, MT.
About Qualia Contemporary Art
Located in downtown Palo Alto, the heart of Silicon Valley, Qualia Contemporary Art is dedicated to showcasing outstanding established and emerging artists working in a variety of media. The gallery is committed to building lasting relationships with artists, collectors, curators, and scholars nationally and internationally, and providing a vital platform for dialogues on contemporary art and culture in the Bay Area and beyond.
Location
328 University Ave
Palo Alto, CA 94301
Gallery Contact
Dacia Xu
650-656-9132
Media Contact
Lainya Magaña, A&O PR
347-395-4155
Check gallery website for hours and additional info
