Sean Scully Solo Exhibition "Painting Surface"

The Sean Scully solo exhibition "Painting Surface" is on display at Lelong Gallery from May 16 to July 5. Born in 1943, Sean Scully is one of the most representative painters of contemporary European abstract painting. Amidst today's storm of literary and anecdotal painting, it is rare to encounter such purely pictorial art. Painting is clearly a matter of surface, but not merely superficial; depth comes from the surface. The primary body of painting is undoubtedly form and color, with organization and intuition becoming its soul.

Scully’s inspiration stems from the rational abstract expressionism of the 1950s—the modernist tradition of Rothko and Stella. He employs Stella’s most basic pictorial language of vertical and parallel lines and color planes, combined with Rothko’s extraordinarily sensual physical brushstrokes. Through the rigorous geometric construction of these diverse forms, he expresses a rational and intuitive sensibility and poetry. As the artist writes: "A painting is nothing much; in this feeling, it is a poor thing made of paint and existing in the state of coagulated pigment, regardless of whatever people try to develop as a result. To transcend this most basic poverty, one must surprise through its integrity and intuition."