Menier Gallery,51 Southwark Street London SE1 1RU

An Art Exhibition by

Laurel HOLLOMAN

17 – 21 November 2015

Opening Hours: Tuesday-Friday 11:00am – 6:00pm and Saturday 10:30am-4:30pm

Private View Tuesday 17th November 6:00pm-9:00pm

Text and photos available on demand from isabelle.van.rolleghem@oenobrands.com

Online catalog available from www.laurelholloman.net

Brother Love (oil on canvas)- 20x30 inches-2015

For her fifth solo exhibition, and first in London, “The Innocents”, the painter Laurel

Holloman takes us on an emotional journey and an exploration of how life changes us, as

we age.

10:00 AM (oil on canvas)-30x34 inches-2015

"The Innocents" is a portrait exhibition (oil on canvas and oil and acrylic on canvas) of women

and children with subjects from 18 months to late 80’s.

“My goal is to photograph, then paint, early childhood and innocence, i.e, life without the

heartbreak to the challenges of adulthood, and then contrast it with more mature portraits. I

have worked with models, all women, and I asked them to share something painful, before the

shoot. Something to do with grief. I was curious as to how difficult events change us when we

grow older. For example, a 24-year-old's portrait may have an air of discovery or curiosity or

even defiance, while a 47-year-old's, after a break-up, may have more heaviness and sadness.

The Undecided (oil on canvas)-48x36 inches-2015

The pieces that portray children (boys and girls) include mostly motion and wonderment. They

may be staring at a sunset or taking a bath or looking at a butterfly.

I found that, with my oldest subject who was in her late 80’s, there was a sense of awe at the

world and it was reflected in her eyes and the energy of her spirit, much like the spirit of a child.

The Sunset (oil on canvas)-20x24 inches-2015

It seemed my middle aged subjects displayed the most burden. When my subject in her 80’s

spoke of her past, there was a sincere feeling of joy and pride. She seemed to be on the other

side of mid- life worries that I was seeing in women in their forties.

Sandra’s Eyes (oil on canvas)- 34X34 inches-2015

With many women in the mid- life range, I purposefully shot nudes and partial nudes.

I saw that even with the sorrow, there was this interesting openness and frankness about their

bodies. I loved the simplicity and naturalness of the nudity combined with the history of

mourning. Often, it is easier to show a body you may have lived with for many years but harder

to reveal all the history of pain it may have endured.

By starting with children I was able to find the juxtaposition between the candidness of our

youth and the stillness of adulthood where life has thrown us curves such as loss or affliction

and the memories that go with it.

I also noticed a certain self consciousness that started to show in my teenaged subjects.

Capturing this, was really exciting and painting it even more so. I feel it is the eyes that reveal so

much in these moments.

Mona Lisa Smile (oil on canvas)-30X36 inches-2015

I have a history in painting large-scale abstracts that capture emotional landscapes. I felt

compelled to tell a different kind of story, as I was indeed myself in middle age and raising two

daughters that were changing so quickly. I have been working very hard to produce a different

kind of show that incorporates traditional portraiture while humanizing it with the emotion of

my work. I played with the balance between some pieces that may have larger brushstrokes and

less blended and other pieces that are very delicately blended and feminine, because it was more

appropriate to each piece than to maintain a certain style. I find, with the paintings of the

children, the brushstrokes are softer and blended, while with some of the adults, more harsh,

hog brush style and the definition not as blended. This was still to remind the audience that the

focus is the painting, not the initial photograph which inspired it. I often completely changed the

background but not the foreground in order to give my subject a feeling of being anywhere, as

the location is not of importance and should not detract from the emotion.”

Laurel Holloman

The Warrior (oil on canvas)-24x42 inches-2015

Biography:

The artist lives and works in Los Angeles (U.S.A.). After an acclaimed debut with her New York

studio collection, TriBeCa in summer 2011, Holloman has had four international solo shows.

Coeur Libre, exhibited at the Pantheon Town Hall (Paris, April 2012) sold out in its first week.

This show was followed by Free Falling only three months later at The Ateneo Veneto and ran

during the 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale to a record breaking attendance and was the first

exhibition to contain two 14 ft murals. Her third solo show, All The World Inside, took place in

Berlin in spring 2013 and included 17 large scale murals in three rooms at the Grand Palazzo

Italia. In summer 2013, her painting Swell was picked for the group show, Nell’Acqua Capisco at

the Venice Art Biennale and was chosen for the official catalogue.

Her latest solo exhibition, The Fifth Element, was held in Paris (Galerie Joseph) in July 2014 and

has met with a public increasingly seduced by the poetic emotion that emerges from the works

of Laurel.

This show was followed in October 2014 by an invitation at the International Contemporary Art

Biennale in Buenos Aires (Argentina). The Reach and Map of The World were chosen for the

installation. The Reach was awarded by the First prize of the Biennale in the paintings category

and Laurel won the Banco Ciudad Award for the Best Work in all categories.

Laurel Holloman earned her Bachelor of Arts at The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

majoring in performance art and visual art. She continued her studies at UCLA and the British

American Drama Academy in London alternating between theatre and visual art. Her early focus

was on performance art especially Dadaism and sculpture and then progressed to painting.