Kathryn MacNaughton

BIOGRAPHY

Canadian artist Kathryn Macnaughton deftly interweaves figurative painting with a combination of abstract expressionism, geometric abstraction, and even conventions of the painted still-life into one poetic statement. Here, these forms of figuration and still life have been flattened, like their more abstract counterparts, to face the frontal plane of the canvas. In this sense, the canvas – and the analog process of the painter’s hand – references the computer screen and the digital touch, where these pieces originally begin to take their shape. Here these concepts are paired with more Romantic expressive movements: a scribble dances across a bust, outlined in silhouette, which guides the viewer’s eye around the flattened curves as one guides the finger across a map.

The work simultaneously houses a sensuality one aligns with gender tropes: as suggestions of feminine curves play shadow-tricks, appearing as vessels or curtains that guide the eye, but also obscure and reveal the picture plane while painterly splatters and curves leap behind and before the picture plane. But also the masculine, referencing brutalist and Modernist architecture: the austerity and monolithic qualities of shape, form, and line, or perhaps even the sharp angles of cacti in the desert.

She graduated from Ontario College of Art and Design in 2007. Solo exhibitions include: Full Body, Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto, Canada (2022); Into the Groove, Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto, Canada (2021);  Heatwave, BEERS London (2020);  Intervals, BEERS London (2018); Fixed State, Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto (2018); Sprang, Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto (2016); and Blue Note, Huntclub Gallery, Toronto (2015). Group exhibitions include: Organized Chaos, Magma Gallery, Bologna, Italy (2019); Pour, Joshua Liner Gallery, New York (2019); Your Favourite Artist’s Favourite Artist II, Joshua Liner Gallery, New York (2019); Dualities: A Bridge Between Two Worlds, Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto (2017); SMASH, Gardiner Museum, Toronto (2016); and The One That Got Away, Artscape Youngplace, Toronto (2015). Fairs include: Future Fair New York, BEERS London, New York (2022). Residencies include: Pada Studios, Lisbon (2019). Macnaughton’s work has been featured in publications such as Elle Magazine, District-W Magazine, and The Coveteur.



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