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New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020
New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020
New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020,  

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020

 

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020,  

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020

 

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020,  

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020

 

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020,  

New York, NY: Miles McEnery Gallery, Warren Isensee, 16 July - 28 August 2020

 

Virtual Tour 

Virtual Tour 

Pillow Talk, 2018, Oil on canvas, 40 x 52 inches, 101.6 x 132.1 cm, MMG#31915

Pillow Talk, 2018, Oil on canvas, 40 x 52 inches, 101.6 x 132.1 cm, MMG#31915

Deep Shit, 2018, Oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches, 121.9 x 121.9 cm, MMG#31913

Deep Shit, 2018, Oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches, 121.9 x 121.9 cm, MMG#31913

Rise and Shine, 2019, Oil on canvas, 38 x 38 inches, 96.5 x 96.5 cm, MMG#31916

Rise and Shine, 2019, Oil on canvas, 38 x 38 inches, 96.5 x 96.5 cm, MMG#31916

Wild Kindness, 2019, Oil on canvas, 42 x 56 inches, 106.7 x 142.2 cm, MMG#32099

Wild Kindness, 2019, Oil on canvas, 42 x 56 inches, 106.7 x 142.2 cm, MMG#32099

Prickly Goo, 2019, Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 inches, 152.4 x 152.4 cm, MMG#31476

Prickly Goo, 2019, Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 inches, 152.4 x 152.4 cm, MMG#31476

Interstellar Overdrive, 2019, Oil on canvas, 69 x 69 inches, 175.3 x 175.3 cm, MMG#31914

Interstellar Overdrive, 2019, Oil on canvas, 69 x 69 inches, 175.3 x 175.3 cm, MMG#31914

Out of Touch, 2020, Oil on canvas, 24 x 24 inches, 61 x 61 cm, MMG#32184

Out of Touch, 2020, Oil on canvas, 24 x 24 inches, 61 x 61 cm, MMG#32184

LOL, 2020, Oil on canvas, 40 x 45 inches, 101.6 x 114.3 cm, MMG#32098

LOL, 2020, Oil on canvas, 40 x 45 inches, 101.6 x 114.3 cm, MMG#32098

As Promised, 2020, Oil on canvas, 50 x 50 inches, 127 x 127 cm, MMG#32182

As Promised, 2020, Oil on canvas, 50 x 50 inches, 127 x 127 cm, MMG#32182

Black Magic, 2020, Oil on canvas, 50 x 50 inches, 127 x 127 cm, MMG#32183

Black Magic, 2020, Oil on canvas, 50 x 50 inches, 127 x 127 cm, MMG#32183

Inner Outer, 2020, Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 inches, 152.4 x 152.4 cm, MMG#32181

Inner Outer, 2020, Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 inches, 152.4 x 152.4 cm, MMG#32181

Something Strange, 2020, Oil on canvas, 65 x 76 inches, 165.1 x 193 cm, MMG#32100

Something Strange, 2020, Oil on canvas, 65 x 76 inches, 165.1 x 193 cm, MMG#32100

Press Release

NEW YORK – MILES McENERY GALLERY is pleased to announce a presentation of new paintings by Warren Isensee. The exhibition will open on 16 July at 525 West 22nd Street and will remain on view through 28 August 2020. The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated publication featuring a text by Ken Johnson. 

Flawlessly executed, Warren Isensee’s paintings present the viewer with a seductive and alluring assortment of shapes and colors. The various patterns and forms fade in and out, while simmering with the artist’s archetypal sense of humor and irony. Titles such as ‘Pillow Talk,’ ‘Rise and Shine,’ and ‘LOL’ playfully riff on phrases inherent to contemporary culture, highlighting Isensee’s negotiation of the line between reality, artifice and representation.

Patterns begin to delightfully pulsate and radiate through the work, in oscillations that are at once hypnotic and soothing. As Ken Johnson notes in his catalogue text Wiggly World: A Conversation with Myself About Warren Isensee’s New Paintings, “with their emphatically flat, frontal, and symmetrical compositions, the repetition and recursion of blobby forms outlined in black and in a tasty range of hues, from chocolaty browns and mossy greens to neon-bright pinks and yellows, all painted, with a precise, silky touch, they are optically dazzling.”

The paintings on display trace their origins to the artist’s series of delicate, miniature pencil drawings, rendered with a concise and single layer of color application. Observed in an historic moment of vast upheaval, unprecedented in living memory, Isensee’s complete body of work celebrates vibrancy, dynamism and spontaneous movement and ultimately imbues the viewer with a sense of optimism. 

WARREN ISENSEE (b. 1956 in Asheville, NC) studied architecture at the University of Oklahoma before majoring in painting and graphic design. He received the Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant in 1999. He was included in the 2007 American Academy of Arts and Letters Invitational Exhibition of Visual Arts, receiving a Purchase Award.

Recent solo exhibitions include “A Decade of Drawings,” Danese/Corey, New York, NY; “Warren Isensee: New Paintings and Drawings,” Danese/Corey, New York, NY; “Warren Isensee: New Drawings,” Nina Freudenheim Gallery, Buffalo, NY; and “Deja View,” Kevin Bruk Gallery, Miami, FL.

Recent group exhibitions include “20/20,” Philip Slein Gallery, St. Louis, MO; “STARS,” Philip Slein Gallery, St. Louis, MO; “Colored Pencil,” McKenzie Fine Art, New York, NY; “Casheesh,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “Fool the Eye,” Nassau County Museum of Art, Roslyn Harbor, NY; “ All Hell Breaks Loose,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “ The Warmth of Winter,” The National Arts Club, New York, NY; “Black and Blue Plus Orange,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “Dialogues: Drawings and Works on Paper,” Satellite Contemporary Gallery, Las Vegas, NV; “Geometrix: Line, Form, Subversion,” Curator’s Office @ Gallery 2112, Washington D.C.; “Manmade,” Holly Johnson Gallery, Dallas, TX; “Hanging Paper,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “If Not For You” (curated by Sue and Phil Knoll), Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “Infinity Mirror,” Herter Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA; “Twenty by Sixteen” (curated by Geoffrey Young), Morgan Lehman Gallery, New York, NY; “Geometric Obsession” (curated by Robert Morgan), Museum of Contemporary Art of Buenos Aires, Argentina; “House,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “Twenty by Sixteen,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; “ Allure,” Jamie Brooks Fine Art, Costa Mesa, CA; “AUGUST a Haze Amniotic Our Dream Aether & Lens of Distance,” Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington, MA; and “Grey Full,” Jeff Bailey Gallery, New York, NY.

His work is included in numerous public and private collections including the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas, Austin, TX; Collezione Maramotti, Reggio Emilia, Italy; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina; Neuberger Berman Collection, New York, NY; Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase, NY; Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS; Time Warner, Inc. , New York, NY; Wellington Management Company, Boston, MA; and West Collection, Oaks, PA.

Warren Isensee lives and works in New York, NY.

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