Diane Rosenstein Gallery is proud to announce the book launch of "Vanessa Prager: Paintings 2020-2024" – a comprehensive monograph presenting fifty-five recent paintings by the Los Angeles-based artist.
Each copy of the book is numbered and signed, and includes an essay, "What I See Of Flowers: The Work of Vanessa Prager," by Amanda Fortini.
“Prager’s paintings are weirder and wittier than one would expect renderings of flowers could possibly be, and this is at least partly owing to her adventurous handling of paint. She builds up layer upon layer, pushing the paint, pulling it, manipulating it, reworking it, until the result hovers somewhere between image and object. Her surfaces are intricate, extravagant; tufts of paint appear to be dripping from, or maybe flying off, the canvas....Prager often mixes multiple colors into what appears to be a single brushstroke or palette-knife smear or finger swipe (she also applies paint with her hands). The universe of each work contains tiny weather systems, little vortexes that pull the viewer’s focus. Each bloom in her cascading floral assemblages gets its own unique rendering; there are thus multiple entry points for the viewer. Although the paintings’ exuberant colors and riotous compositions replicate well in photos—or on Instagram, where we inevitably look at art these days—their materiality and excess are experienced to maximum effect up close, in person. ‘I really do like to overwork things,’ Prager says, ‘I’ve tried to do the ‘loose’ thing and it just doesn’t satisfy me.’” -- Amanda Fortini
168 pages. Softcover. Published by Diane Rosenstein Gallery. Limited edition of 150. Signed and numbered. $90.00 (+tax).
