Ille Arts is please to present “11”, a new body of work by New York artist Liz Markus. As in all her previous exhibitions Markus named the show with a wink to pop culture. In this case “11” is the number the amps go up to in "This Is Spinal Tap" the Rob Reiner film that started the mockumentary genre. www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuzpsO4ErOQ
These paintings are indeed one louder. They don’t stop at ten. They go to all the way to eleven.
Markus pulls out all the stops here. Gone are the subtle and hazy landscapes of her latest show at ZieherSmith, “The Look Of Love”. There Markus captured a moody mix of romance and phsychedelia. In “11” the brush strokes are confident and the saturated colors powerfully stain the unprimed canvases. This show captures Markus’ experience in her studio and her personal life. In her own words the artist describes her process: “ In May my father became ill and passed away. I spent three weeks in Buffalo in the house I grew up in and I was thinking a lot about growing up in the late 70's and having too much free time in the summer, hanging out with my brother, listening to music and watching TV. From that I ended making paintings that look like they might be doodles out of some bored metal head high school kid's history book. Gabor is my dad's name. Somehow I started to draw his name like it was a logo for a metal band. I like to think of Gabor as been some huge metal band out of Eastern Europe.”
Paying homage to such iconoclastic punk bands as the Ramones and maybe subconsciously referring back to the B-52s’ Rock Lobster, Markus’s paintings are historical instagrams. Her Bill painting is a De Kooning portrait, but it also bears a great resemblance to her late father Gabor. In Liz Markus’ life, art and personal events coexist on one conscious level. She, like no other of her peers, can pull together the striking visual and biographical narrative.
Press:
The Huffington Post, Feb. 2012
DNAInfo, Feb. 2012
Culture Catch, Feb. 2012
Artcritial, 2009
The Huffington Post, Oct. 2009
Spider Crab Gabor 1,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
60
x
48
inches
Bill and Gabor 1,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
60
x
48
inches
Gabor Lobster,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Permission to Land,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Breakfast in America,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Now I Want to Sniff Some Glue,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Fuck It,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Gulf Ford GT horizontal,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
48
x
60
inches
Gulf Ford GTvertical,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
60
x
40
inches
Ramon,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
60
x
40
inches
Spider Crab Gabor 3,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
60
x
40
inches
Spider Crab Gabor 2,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
36
x
24
inches
Gabor Lobster,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
24
x
36
inches
Ford GT 1,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
24
x
36
inches
Glitter GT,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
24
x
36
inches
GT Ghost,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
24
x
36
inches
Ford Gulf GT front,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
22
x
28
inches
Bill,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
28
x
22
inches
Bill and Gabor 2,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
28
x
22
inches
Lobster,
2012
Acrylic and graphite on unprimed canvas,
28
x
22
inches