Stuart Semple
I first became aware of Stuart Semple when I stumbled (quite literally!) across his exhibition ‘Fake Plastic Love’ at the Truman Brewery in 2007. My interest was further captured when, in February, Semple released over 2,000 smiley-faced ‘clouds’- made from helium, soap and vegetable dye- outside London’s Tate Modern.
Semple is now the subject of a solo exhibition at the Anna Kustera Gallery in New York. His enormous canvases are ‘pop culture cocktails’- full of rich and intense colour, obsessed with the reproduced and constructed image he is a modern day Pop artist of the highest order. Comparisons with Andy Warhol and Jeff Koons are almost obligatory, as he borrows from pop culture and references Marilyn Monroe. Semple is, however, a painter and this ensures his meticulously painted canvases retain personality and a sense of creativity- a direct contrast to the shallow and superficial icons and everyday imagery of which he is so fond.
Everlasting Nothing Less runs until June 20, Anna Kustera Gallery, 520 West 21st Street, New York.
Vicki Loomes
