28 June – 22 July 2023
Despard Gallery is pleased to host the fourth solo exhibition Hyper, by Tasmanian artist Josh Foley.
Based in Launceston, Tasmania, Foley continues his exploration into how painting can be a both a method and a means to challenge common perceptions. Within this new body of work, Foley has fully surrendered to the materiality of paint, allowing its natural fluidity to seemingly liquify every composition. Rendered through combinations of oil, acrylic and impasto mixed media, Foley’s practice unveils a tangled visual macrocosm, where familiar scenes erupt into a complex web of colourful connections and psychedelia. Inspired from both Foley’s local surrounds, as well as well-known historical genres, such as landscape and still life, each painting remains in a state of constant flux, compositions fluctuating between representation and abstraction in a unending pursuit of a visual equilibrium.
Josh Foley graduated in 2004 with a Bachelor of Contemporary Art (Hons) from the University of Tasmania. He has been the recipient of numerous grants and residencies, as well as a finalist in art awards nationally, winning The Glover Prize in 2011. His work is held in private collections throughout Australia, as well as in the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, the University of Tasmania & Art Bank. In 2020, Queen Victoria Museum & Art Gallery hosted Calculating Infinity, a major immersive exhibition by Foley that interpreted its permanent collection. The exhibition was presented in association with MONA FOMA 2020 and featured a live performance of Foley’s alter-ego, Xydep Xydahlia.
Click here to register your interest for Josh Foley.
