Francesco Clemente to Display Nostalgic Seascapes in Lévy Gorvy Online Exhibition
His saturated watercolors call attention to a time of loss and discovery.
Lévy Gorvy gallery is featuring 12 watercolor works by Italian contemporary artist Francesco Clemente in an online viewing room. Titled “Beauty Without Witness, April 2020,” the exhibition showcases richly colored works of seascapes that evoke fantastical worlds and childhood memories. Each watercolor was painted by the artist at his MacDougal Street home in New York while self-isolating during the pandemic.
For his latest works, Clemente explores the “in-between,” the gap between the internal and external worlds of the mind and body, symbolized by the subject of the shoreline and the blurred lines created by watercolor. His saturated, vivid hues seem to defy the transparency inherent to the medium, as he sees the need to ground “this space in between where we are sitting.” Inspired by Japanese ukiyo-e prints, Clemente dates each work with a stamp-like rectangle — a recent motif in his decades-long work with watercolor.
“Beauty Without Witness, April 2020” is part of an ongoing series of online presentations that will benefit #FirstRespondersFirst, an initiative that will help provide protective equipment, childcare, food and more to first responder healthcare workers serving on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic. A portion of the proceeds from the sales of Clemente’s work will be donated to the cause.
Beginning May 15, “Beauty Without Witness, April 2020” will be available to view on Lévy Gorvy’s website. The exhibition will run until May 29.
In other news, Olafur Eliasson has unveiled his first-ever augmented reality (AR) project called WUNDERKAMMER.
