Austin Eddy: Still Life

My goal is to create a space for you

In his painterly work, Austin Eddy formulates contradictions, draws on the traditions of classical modernism and works on the balance between figuration and abstraction. In terms of motifs, birds, fish and flowers play the main role in his works. These figurative elements unfold into still lifes, landscapes and cityscapes. Worked in bold colours and modulated with different textures of paint application, the pictorial elements enter into a perspectival interaction, into a network of lines and surfaces and thus become a complex structure of spatial overlays. Similar pictorial motifs appear again and again in different formations, colours and compositions. This serial work and the abstract nature of the motifs initially contradict the idea of a lively, growing and expressive depiction of nature. In fact, the artist is less concerned with a spontaneous expression of closeness to nature than with an examination of how nature is conveyed in art. The title of the book and exhibition also point to this connection: Still Life - still a living still - captured in an atmospheric work of vibrant colours, vivid border motifs and abstract planes of light. This play with distance and a deep connection to nature finds a poetic and minimalist formulation in Austin Eddy's work.

Exhibition:
Kunstverein Heilbronn, 21/9 - 24/11/2024