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Tom Bolles: Reverence
March 22 –April 28, 2017
Opening Reception: Wednesday, March 22, 5:30 - 7:30
Andrea Schwartz Gallery is pleased to announce the third exhibition of Tom Bolles entitled Reverence.
“What always attracts me in art by others, and what I attempt to achieve in my own art, is an indefinable and elusive balance between color, light, and surface”. – Tom Bolles
Tom Bolles’ current body of work is an amalgamation of inspirations he gained from recent travels both abroad and at home, as well as themes he has been working on throughout his practice. As with his previous work, each work acknowledges our digital era by virtue of initially being designed on a computer using 0’s and 1’s. He continues to employ stripes, bold or fine, straight or curved. The approach and the materials of Bolles’ is a result of his seeing, and absorbing art and architecture in Rome, Florence, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco over the last 18 months. Many of his current pieces are a mixture of varied styles from Op Art of the 1960’s to utilizing a tondo format from the Renaissance.
All artists, architects, and musicians borrow ideas from their peers, consciously, or unconsciously. At this moment, Bolles is doing so consciously. He titled the exhibition “Reverence” because he would like to honor the works of art by masters as diverse as Sandro Botticelli and Robert Irwin.
Tom Bolles is a native San Franciscan, but was educated back East. As a teenager he was influenced by the Op and Pop movements of the 60s and he is still drawn to the strong palettes of that era.
Over the past 20 years the majority of his work would best be called minimal, though a very painterly version of that genre. His paintings exhibit luminous and incandescent surfaces, which result from the application of multiple layers of translucent acrylic paint. As he moves through layer by layer, the preceding colors can be detected under the surface, giving the painting depth and subtlety.
Periodically he has explored digitally inspired imagery, or including text, or, most recently, distorted images of toys, displaying some previously hidden humor. Most artworks are acrylic on canvas, but many others are mixed media with tinted resins, and still others are cast resin sculptures. No matter the subject matter, the work always reflect a keen interest in saturated colors and pristine finishes. Many seem to glow from within.
Founded in San Francisco in 1982, Andrea Schwartz Gallery focuses on contemporary painting of mid-career artists. For over twenty-five years, Andrea Schwartz Gallery has supported work that is challenging and at the forefront of contemporary practice, representing a select group of artists from the Bay Area and throughout the country.
In 2012, Andrea Schwartz Gallery moved to its current location in South of Market district, blocks away from the new San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, AT&T Park, and the Moscone Center. The space itself was specifically designed for artwork exhibition, including 20-foot ceilings and ground floor visibility.
Andrea Schwartz Gallery exhibits at art fairs across the country with the goal to introduce our artists to a wider audience. Recent exhibitions at the gallery have been reviewed in ArtNews, Artweek, Art Ltd., Fine Art Connoisseur, San Francisco Chronicle, SF Weekly, Art Voices, and Juxtapoz Magazine, as well as many online publications.
