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Angelbert Metoyer "Venus and the Squid, 2016 - 2021,"acrylic, enamel, charcoal, gold dust, oil, spray paint, and pigment on canvas. 92 x 86 inches.
Angelbert Metoyer "The Dance (Shadow Drawing )," 2021, oil on wood, 72 x 84 inches. Angelbert Metoyer The Dance (Shadow Drawing ),ZEV STARR-TAMBOR, COURTESY TRIPOLI GALLERY, © ANGELBERT METOYER 2021
Angelbert Metoyer "Magnificent Change" Installation View. Angelbert Metoyer The Dance (Shadow Drawing ),ZEV STARR-TAMBOR, COURTESY TRIPOLI GALLERY, © ANGELBERT METOYER 2021
Tripoli Gallery in Wainscott is currently hosting artist-in-residence Angelbert Metoyer and his solo exhibition “Magnificent Change.” As he uses the gallery as his temporary studio, the performance of “Magnificent Change” will be a living symbolic garden and installation leading to the artist’s reception on Saturday, April 24, from 6 to 9 p.m. The completed exhibition will remain on view until May 3. The residency and exhibition will lead to the release of two new works for a contemporary auction in June at Sotheby’s.
With his main studio based in Houston, the American painter and Afrofuturist will draw on recent sojourns in light to inform this new body of work. Works as early as 2008, transformed during this residency, create a strong connection to the cosmos and nature. Using past works in his process, Metoyer constructs in concert with the elements to create artworks that exhibit life force and vitality, permeated texturally with historical references and thematic layers. He explores memory, mythology and metamorphosis through the channels of history, philosophy and theology. Boundless by materiality, these various medias combining conventional artistic mediums with nontraditional materials such as coal, oil, tar and gold dust (“excrements of industry” as he calls them) exhibit an otherworldly quality. His practice is reminiscent of horticultural pruning and through his ongoing collaboration in nature, Metoyer utilizes the light and the performative history of painting on the East End.
An ongoing element of his work, his shadow drawing techniques have found a way to be uncovered here in Wainscott and connected to the history of action painting through this residency.
Metoyer studied drawing and painting at the Atlanta College of Art. His work can be found in the permanent collections of the U.S. Department of State, Houston Museum of Fine Art, The Charles H. Wright Museum, African American Museum of Contemporary Art, the ACE Collection, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Leipzig, Germany. “Magnificent Change” marks his second solo show at Tripoli Gallery following “After Life” in 2017.
Tripoli Gallery is at 26 Ardsley Road in Wainscott. For more information, visit tripoligallery.com.
Staff Writer on Apr 12, 2021