This recent collection of works by British figurative painter Rupert Shrive reflects on the artist's trajectory and the influence of his time spent living in London, Paris and Valencia. The show features a diverse range of 38 artworks, from his cross-genre paintings and landscape compositions to his new series of ‘Lockdown Lives’ – still lives animated with unusual objects – which together illustrate the evolution of Shrive's unique figurative style.
At the heart of Shrive’s practice is an interest in abstracting human form. His work is influenced by the School of London of the 1970s: a group of figurative painters that included David Hockney, Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon, with whom Shrive became acquainted in the pubs of Soho while a St Martins student in the 1980s. From Freud’s intense observation and Hockney’s technical experimentation, to Bacon’s breaking up and rebuilding of the subject, Shrive’s inspirations culminate in his own distinctive body of work.
To enjoy a virtual walkthrough of this exhibition, view here: https://emperia.gallery/
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Cross-Genre Paintings
Primarily a painter, Shrive’s practice also encompasses sculpture and collage. For his ‘cross-genre paintings’ – first created in London in the 2000s – the artist crushes paintings into sculptures, before re-supposing them as collages or repainting them. As shown in artworks such as Self-Portrait (2020), by this process of deconstruction and reconstruction and introducing chaos to order, Shrive challenges traditional concepts of form and perspective.
‘This particular genre came about by accident,’ Shrive explains. ‘I tore up a drawing of an animal that wasn’t quite right, and as the pieces lay on the floor with the sudden appearance of something monstrous, I realised they might be rearranged to create something else. My ways of working - blurring the lines between painting, sculpture and collage - make it somewhat difficult to categorise. I’m interested in taking things further than might be expected.’
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Urban and Landscape Compositions
Where the School of London artists traditionally painted human form, Shrive’s recent subjects have included urban and landscape paintings inspired by his surroundings: ‘But even those I see as portraits,’ he says. From coastal views in Brittany to snowy street scenes in Montmartre (where Shrive is now based), the resulting compositions evoke a strong sense of place and the artist’s intimate association with each location.
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Tree Series
The importance of place across Shrive’s work is particularly apparent in his striking series of fig tree works. Painted in Valencia, where the artist has lived on and off for a number of years, they variously depict the same fig tree in different angles, periods and materials including gold leaf. Imperilled by the construction of a petrol station, the fig tree in these paintings stands as a potent symbol of the constant struggle between nature and man.
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Rupert Shrive, Petrol Station Ficus 5 (with Dog), 2021, oil on linen, 38 ¼ x 51 1/8 in, 97 x 130 cm
The richness and character with which Shrive depicts the fig tree draws us into the intimacy of the scene, where the buttress roots spread like fingers in cloth across the park.
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Rupert Shrive, Wishing Tree, 2021, oil on linen, 51 1/8 x 76 ¾ in, 130 x 195 cm
Nature also provides the inspiration for the newest work in this show, the evocative Wishing Tree, painted in Derbyshire.
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'Lockdown Lives'
The 'Lockdown Lives' series was mostly painted from Shrive's studio in Montmartre during the Paris lockdowns in 2020. Depicting vegetables and other objects in theatrical or absurd mises-en-scène, the works reflect both the mundanity and the extraordinarness of life in confinement.
The series was partly inspired by Spanish Enlightenment painter Juan Sánchez Cotán, one of the pioneers of Spanish still lives in the 16th century, whose work features vegetables suspended mid-air in beautiful settings. Shrive's reimagining of these works projects an ironic humour onto the scene that captures the uniquely strange experience of lockdown in 2020.
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Rupert Shrive, La Lune, 2020, oil on polyester, 11 3/8 x 8 5/8 in, 29 x 22 cm
'Buying vegetables became a significant part of the day,' Shrive says. 'There weren't many places open but I still managed to find what I needed and as I had to spend all of my time in the studio, I started setting them up as maquettes in little theatres or mises-en-scène, to create a kind of narrative or dialogue around them - before painting them and then eating them for supper.'
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After 'Lockdown Lives'
Testament to the artist’s ever-evolving versatility, ‘Lockdown Lives’ has prompted a new emphasis in Shrive’s work that has continued outside of the studio. The artist’s most recent compositions feature random objects and belongings thrown out by people onto the streets. These images of domestic detritus serve as a metaphor for the pared-down nature of life during the pandemic.
