Kwai Lau   new paintings

 

Kiss - 2001  oil on linen  24 x 26 cm

 

16 June to 22 July 2001

Kwai Laus exhibition has been in the making for three years.  The nine paintings presented here are slowly and convulsively executed:  the pigments first ground then mixed with linseed oil are applied, layer after layer, onto thick linen.  The rhetorical process produces deep, densely coloured surfaces animated by undulating lines.

Kwai experiences each painting like a journey into the unconscious and the conscious, the East and the West.  Control and impulsiveness take turns in constructing what becomes, after so many layers, a three- dimensional object where the surface engulfs the support.

A catalogue with an essay by Anthony Spira will be available.

Kwai Lau was born in China in 1967.  She first studied at the Wolverhampton University College of Arts, then was a post graduate in painting at the Royal Academy Schools in London (1989 92).  Recent selected exhibitions include:  1996 - English Landscapes, Danielle Arnaud.  1997 Half the Sky, Museum of London.  1998 Global, Addison Wesley Longman; Cheltenham Open Drawing Show; Clink Wharf Gallery, London;  Solo exhibition, Danielle Arnaud, London.  1999 Three Young Painters, Hart Gallery, London.  Her work is represented in private collections in USA and England and can be seen at Nobu (Metropolitan Hotel, London).  In 1998, Kwai received the Dupree Family Award.