Kristy Luck: Neutral Busy Pleasure

Philip Martin Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of new paintings on paper by Kristy Luck. The on-line presentation follows Luck's highly regarded solo exhibition at the gallery. Kristy Luck's show during Frieze Los Angeles was reviewed in Art in America, Los Angeles Times and numerous other publications. 

Kirsty Luck's paintings on paper engage brushwork as both depictive device and physical record. Luck's open relationship with the viewer empowers journey and intuition. She comments, "I want the way the painting is made to be revealed in certain areas of the painting...this gives other people access to my process, and to the process of making the painting." In Luck's work, vibrant stippled passages sit against brushed lines and nuanced gradients. Space, color, light and design work together to shape a subtle pictorial field with an active painterly surface that enables visual and emotional depth.

Luck herself is kind of traveller in her own work, returning to express her ideas in related pictures again and again. Often the key is color: "I think of it as revisiting the same place at a different time of day, or years later. The color, the emphasis, the images, all shift and change - like music." Luck goes on to point out, "Color as a narrative device can be incredibly elusive. Both the image and the emotional experience are guided by the color. It is nuanced and requires intimacy." The viewer's eye travels past fluid forms and colors that elicit subconscious feeling; organic and dreamlike, Luck's paintings on paper suggest shape and form - the human body, plants, the primordial landscape - then collapse in waves of color, dots and lines. 

Inspired by artists and writers like Carol Rama and Clarice Lispector, Kristy Luck's work addresses sensuality, imagination and memory. We experience these spaces as if in a dream: "Part of how I gauge when a piece is finished is that there is no pre-dominant read." There is a sense of presence in these works, but also one of absence, a feeling of things coming together, and breaking apart. 

Kristy Luck (b. 1985, Woodstock, IL) received a BFA from Rockford University (Rockford, IL) and a MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, IL). Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Philip Martin Gallery (Los Angeles, CA); ODD ARK LA (Los Angeles, CA); Eastside International (Los Angeles, CA); and Tiger Strikes Asteroid (Chicago, IL). Additionally, her work has been included in group shows at Torrance Art Museum (Torrance, CA); Jacob’s West (Los Angeles, CA); 0-0LA (Los Angeles, CA); Guerrero Gallery (San Francisco, CA); Corbett vs. Dempsey (Chicago, IL); A Public Space (Fishers Island, New York); and Projet Pangée (Montreal, Canada). Luck was awarded the Lighthouse Works Fellowship in 2017. Her work has been featured in numerous publications including Art in America, Los Angeles Times, Architectural Digest, Artillery Magazine, Whitehot Magazine, The Editorial Magazine and Opening Ceremony. Luck lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.