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Jamie Gallagher: Threads of Existence

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Date: 
Saturday, 7 September 2024 to Saturday, 28 September 2024
Opening: 
Saturday, 7 September 2024 - 5:00pm to 9:00pm

In Threads of Existence, British artist Jamie Gallagher explores the intertwined journey of humanity and artificial intelligence, using a blend of live model studies and AI-generated forms to create a contorted, uncanny portrayal of existence. This body of work is born from a cyclical process of painting, reprocessing through AI, returning to analogue techniques, and finally into tapestry, developing a visual language that reflects humanity’s race toward an uncertain future—a future we often resist confronting.

Tapestry holds a significant place in human creative expression, serving as both an art form and a storytelling medium for thousands of years. Historically, it has been used to depict narratives, preserve cultural heritage, and communicate complex ideas long before written records were widely accessible. The intricate weaving process of tapestry, blending materials, colors, and textures, reflects a deep connection to craftsmanship and the physicality of creation. It embodies a communal and enduring artistic practice, where every thread contributes to a larger picture, symbolizing the interconnectedness of human experience. As an art form, tapestry captures the essence of time, memory, and identity, making it a powerful and enduring expression of human creativity.

The works in this show are deeply personal, serving as a breadcrumb trail through Gallagher’s own states of mind during their creation. By merging human instinct with AI's reinterpretations, he aims to provoke viewers to overlay their own experiences onto the imagery, transforming the work into a shared yet uniquely personal encounter. The balance between figuration and abstraction in Gallagher’s art invites this interaction, as we naturally seek reflections of ourselves within these forms.

AI has come to play a pivotal role in Gallagher’s process. Initially, it was turned to it for fresh perspectives, allowing the artist’s imagination to wander into new territories. However, during a period of creative block, it was the AI’s reinterpretation of earlier works that reignited his spontaneity, teaching him to loosen up and trust his instincts again. This collaboration between human and machine, moving fluidly between analogue and digital, is central to the works Gallagher presents now. Though AI contributes to the process, the final pieces remain unmistakably his, resonating with a visceral, instinctual creation that mirrors his approach to painting.

Ultimately, Gallagher’s work seeks to provoke a response—whether joy, discomfort, or introspection. It is here, in these reactions, and the deeply personal connections viewers make, that the work is realized.

Curator :

Artist ( Description ): 

Somewhere along the border of figurative and abstract, Jamie Gallagher’s visceral, contorted portraits reveal states of the human psyche, manifested as a refined use of colour and texture. Gallagher brings his comprehensive knowledge of colour theory and composition, developed in his twenty-year career as an artistic director, to his paintings, allowing him to enact a push and pull between figurative and expressionist forms which reflect the root of his practice: a pursuit of introspection. Born in Edinburgh, Gallagher slowly made his way south to study design at University of the West of England in Bristol, before settling in Herefordshire. He now splits his time between his studio in rural Herefordshire, and Toronto, where he runs a creative agency. His career in creative direction led him to explore a range of media, from photography and virtual reality to typography and branding. However, he didn’t begin painting until around 2015, a time in which the loss of a close friend, a painter, inspired him to turn to the medium as a means of processing grief and the general ebbs and flows occurring in his life. For Gallagher, painting became therapy: the materiality and process a welcome vehicle for simultaneously exploring the medium and his mind. Gallagher uses the physicality of paint to explore the border between abstraction and figuration, he considers his practise to be more the guidance of materials and reactions to their behaviour, than an intent to create a specific image. A deep connection with the materials and tactility of the process feed the work—From the heavy impasto oils and raw, textured linens to delicate gold leaf, diamond dust and bleeding inks—each mark is instinctive, each image forged during the process rather than conceived of in advance. Shifting uncomfortably from sensitive to brutal, his work finds beauty in life’s more visceral themes.

Despite no formal fine arts training, Gallagher’s style is nuanced and concrete, with a Bacon-esque atmosphere. Gallagher’s process is intuitive, improvisational, and reactive. He doesn’t work from reference; rather, he approaches his portraits with a figurative intent. He nurtures his muscle memory and familiarity with the human body through live model sessions and is currently exploring the use of AI-generated figures as inspiration, finding that the contorted and uncanny renderings bring a different body of language to his work. It is only after completion, when his paintings lay against the studio wall, that he uncovers what was processed in the making of the work. Naming his works is an intrinsic part of his process. While his titles may not hold significance for everyone, for Gallagher, they are personal breadcrumb-trail to his state of mind whilst the work was made. Gallagher’s practice, which started in an old mill-turned-studio, blossomed from a private pursuit to sharing his art with the public when he was approached to hold a solo exhibition, Post Normality Reality Disorder, in 2018. Gallagher has since been shown in multiple galleries and institutions across the UK, and his work is held in private collections worldwide. His paintings remain deeply personal explorations of the human condition, and more specifically, his own internal condition, with their engaging use of colour and composition an invitation to reflect on our own state of being.

Venue ( Address ): 

804 Sutter Street
San Francisco, CA 94109

Ryan Graff Contemporary , San Francisco

 


 

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Other events from Ryan Graff Contemporary

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Mark Gleason: Nowhere Here
10/05/2024 to 10/26/2024
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Jamie Gallagher: Threads of Existence
09/07/2024 to 09/28/2024
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Barron Storey: Revisitation Volume I
07/13/2024 to 08/24/2024
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Kai Samuels-Davis: Emergence
05/04/2024 to 06/01/2024

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