SAO PAULO.- Galeria Fortes Vilaça presents Interior Design, the second solo show by Simon Evans in Brazil. His artistic practice enjoys the collaboration of Sarah Lannan, his wife and creative partner. The British artist presents new works that reaffirm his unique artistic language, characterized by elaborate collages of fragments of paper, texts and images. The obsessive character of his compositions is blended with elements of his home life, evoked by objects from his household and by his interest in textiles.
The use of text, extensively explored in all of Evans’s work, is not so directly present here, opening space for drawing and the form to take center stage. The writings of Selfish Prayer Rug seem less interested in forming words and more apt to create abstract patterns that accompany the surface relief of the piece – two yoga mats.
Collecting materials for the works plays an important role in the artist’s practice, blending the attributed meanings with his own life stories. Repetition of the idea of the form. Materials that deny us Immortality was created from walks through New York parks, where the artist collected hundreds of four-leaf clovers. In the work, he organizes the plants into a quasi-landscape, reflecting his yearning for healthy habits and, in a wider sense, a dogged search for good luck.
In The World Beats Art, the carpet that Evans has at home is re-created in fragments of photos, drawings and objects that emulate the original pattern. For its part, Door was produced through a detailed process of weaving: small strips of paper are woven to compose a sort of fabric. Textile elements also pervade other works and lend unity to the exhibition; they are important not only for imparting a sense of familiarity, but also for introducing the idea of weaving – a slow and introspective activity, in opposition to the contemporary immediatism. Evans echoes this artisanal approach in his works and, through a web of personal narratives, reveals his own interior design.
Simon Evans was born in 1972 in London and currently lives and works in New York. His solo shows have most notably included Only Words Eaten By Experience, MOCA Cleveland (USA, 2013); First We Make the Rules, Then We Break the Rules (Simon Evans & Öyvind Fahlström), Kunsthalle Düsseldorf (Germany, 2012) and Kunsthal Charlottenborg (Copenhagen, Denmark, 2012); How to Be Alone When You Live with Someone, MUDAM (Luxembourg, 2012); and How to get about, Aspen Art Museum (USA, 2005). The artist has participated in the following biennials: the 12th Bienal de Istanbul (Turkey, 2011); 31st Panorama da Arte Brasileira, MAM (São Paulo, 2009); 27th Bienal de São Paulo (2006); and the California Biennial, OCMA (Newport Beach, USA, 2004). His work is present in various important collections, such as Aspen Art Museum (Aspen, USA), CIFO (Miami, USA), Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (Humlebaek, Denmark), Miami Art Museum (Miami, USA), MUDAM (Luxembourg), Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia, USA), SFMOMA (San Francisco, USA), and others.
