JOHN R NEESON

LVII & SHOWROOM

November 12 – December 13, 2026

LVII in Project Space 1 & SHOWROOM in Project Space 2 bring together the two strands of my work, site referential and Still life painting, at a single location. Both groups of paintings function around the specifics of architecture and light that characterize each gallery space.

LVII is a site referential painting installation and the 57th in a series of projects that have characterized my work since 1993. All of these have taken place at locations that do not conform to the hermetic ‘white cube’.

In this case the paintings are records of the changing hues of the external wall directly outside the windows of Project Space 1 at various times of the day over a year as reflected in square mirrors. These mirror images, which are already mediations of reality, when framed by the beveled edge and bisected by transoms and mullions are further removed from the actual towards the reductive.

Once recognized as reflections the observer/participant is drawn into the mechanics of the installation as a three-dimensional experience in which the actual (real) and the copy (illusion) continually switch around. The processes of observation closely duplicating that of the making. 

Project Space 2 on the other hand conforms to the ubiquitous contemporary gallery isolated from the outside world, fluctuations of light and the passage of time. In this space the SHOWROOM paintings further my investigation into ‘the Still life’ as a versatile contemporary genre. In this case as mercantile display.

The gallery becomes an Outlet for painted representations of terrazzo tile samples. Initially these tiles are examples of the work of artisans skilled at evenly distributing a slurry of stone aggregate and binder across a floor, then grinding and polishing it to a finished surface. The variations of tone and colour across this plane so controlled they do not give rise to pareidolia. There is a direct correlation between the discipline of these craftspeople and the control demonstrated in the most rigorous tachiste influenced abstract paintings. The irony in this project is the dichotomy in displaying painted copies of non-figurative images. 

Image1: IX (Roman Numeral ‘9’) for the XVII painting. I have 10 works to choose from but I don’t think I’ll hang them all.

Image2: SHOWROOM 5.    For the SHOWROOM painting. But again it will depend on it’s place in the hang.