The Belkin Satellite is pleased to present new works by one of Canada’s most celebrated contemporary painters. Attila Richard Lukacs rose to prominence following the success of the Young Romantics exhibition held at the Vancouver Art Gallery in 1985. Shortly thereafter, Lukacs moved to Berlin and gained international recognition for his inventive play with the conventions of nineteenth-century salon and history painting. Populated with suggestive figures such as skinheads and monkeys and composed of paint, tar and other unorthodox materials, Lukacs’ visceral tableaux forged a compelling mixture of erotic provocation and political critique. Since the mid-1990s Lukacs has reformulated his practice to include variations on the traditions of nature, still life and abstract painting – at each turn reinvesting the image with sensual and visceral effects.
Lukacs’s most recent experiments mark a clear departure from his earlier use of traditional materials and means. The new works featured in the Belkin Satellite exhibition have been produced from layers of paper and tissue and covered in polyurethane to form semi-translucent sheets. Drawn and painted markings cover both sides of each work denying the singular perspective of traditional paintings. The visceral effects of Lukacs’ earlier works are maximized – as the viewer circles each suspended parchment, its surface periodically coheres into human and animal forms only to dissolve into abstraction.