Galerie Zlotowski Eugene J. Martin

 

Galerie Zlotowski Eugene J. Martin Exhibition from April 28 to June 30 2023 Galerie Zlotowski is delighted to present in its space on the rue de Seine the first monographic exhibition dedicated to the African-American painter Eugene J. Martin, from 28 April to 30 June 2023.

Eugene J. Martin, The poor image toy, 1991. Acrylique sur papier. 74x54,4 cm. ©Estate of Eugene J. Martin  As part of its commitment to highlighting 20th century artistic figures, Galerie Zlotowski has launched a major project to rediscover the luminous, surprisingly free and joyful work of Eugene J. Martin.  Among a selection of key works, the exhibition brings together untitled works from the Oval Drawings series (1971-1974), colourful creations inscribed in a detached oval on a white background, which are surprising for being so far removed from the dominant trends of the time.  Another series, called the Bamboo Drawings, is executed on paper with a bamboo calamus (a stylus carved from bamboo) in ink of different colours. With these simple means, the artist expresses an impressive subtlety of features, forms and chromatic shades in the range of greys, blues, ochres and browns. A collection of collages, made in the 1980s and 1990s, includes works with resolutely free, playful geometries and extraordinarily luminous assemblages.  The acrylics on paper produced in the 1990s also presented in the exhibition demonstrate the artist's extreme mastery of constructions, the vibrant palette of his colours and his unpredictable apparitions, on the tenuous, sensitive line between representation and abstraction.

Launch of a new collection of books dedicated to the gallery by Editions Martin de Halleux On the occasion of this exhibition, the gallery and Les Éditions Martin de Halleux have joined forces to launch a new collection of books dedicated to modern art, the avant-gardes of the early 20th century and artists of the second half of the 20th century, following the gallery's exhibitions. Dedicated to the Eugene J. Martin exhibition, the first volume of the collection is a bilingual (French and English), 20x20 cm bound and sewn edition of 72 pages, with over 50 works reproduced. The book, with a preface by Suzanne Fredericq, the artist's widow, is accompanied by a text by Philippe Dagen.