AMSTERDAM.- Galerie Gabriel Rolt announces Peter Schuyff, the artist’s second solo exhibition at the gallery.

Peter Schuyff has been key to the abstract art landscape for over more than 30 years.

Rooted in the concepts of the New York 80’s artistic movement Neo- Geo, the typical patterns of Schuyff’s canvasses, consisting of geometrical and tridimensional shapes, persist in what seems to be an eternal movement. The use of primary forms, like squares and circles, suggests the existence of a primordial world, made by pure geometry. It’s here, in this indefinable dimension, that these different lines and shapes meet light, the essential element which initiate their calm mobility.

The strong suggestion of rotation and movement is the result, thus, of a light-geometry interplay, mixed with different nuances of colours and shadow tones: the colour white, together with the fundamental element of light, is what distinguishes Schuyff’s new body of work.

The angular patterns of Schuyff’s works refer so to trigonometric, mathematical shapes, but also to computer-generated motives, creating an intricate web of calculated forms. Some of the patterns employed by Schuyff also seem to get mixed with historical or artistic symbols and semi-recognizable plaids from the consumption society. While one of the exhibited works, for example, carries the traces of an Ottoman-like symbolism, other works seem to cite the formal language of artists from De Stijl, like Mondrian, or they play with the familiar pattern of a world-known English brand from the fashion industry.

These half-recognizable suggestions are transient allusions: they hint towards a possible recognition, but they ultimately leave the viewer with an unsettled feeling. Even though there are traces of familiarity, the patterns of Schuyff’s paintings are in a world of their own: floating, shifting, evolving, in a dimension that remains pure, untouched.

Peter Schuyff (Baarn, NL, 1958) was born in the Netherlands and grew up in Canada where he studied at the Vancouver School of Arts. As the son of an artist and a professor at the Simon Fraser University Vancouver, Schuyff became intrigued with the radical views of the art world in the 60’s and 70’s and driven by artistic ambitions, decided to move to New York City at the age of 18.

During the 1980’s Peter Schuyff became a prominent figure in the booming NYC art scene, where in the East Village, he was inspired by friends and colleagues Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, Sol Lewitt, Jean Michel Basquiat and Herbert Hunke. Schuyffs paintings, in which he combines old master techniques with geometrical minimalistic forms, made him one of the quintessential artists of the Neo-Geo movement, together with artists like Peter Halley, Ashley Bickerton and Jeff Koons. During this period of his life, Schuyff had solo exhibitions at Leo Castelli Gallery (1987, NYC), Gagosian Gallery (1985, NYC) and Barbara Galdstone Gallery (1983, Brussels); his works were included in the collection of MOMA (NYC), MOCA (LA), Metropolitan Museum of Art (NYC), Magasin III (Stokholm) and the Fisher Landau Foundation.

In 2014 Schuyff’s work was included in the Whitney Biennal, reaffirming his name as an artist and the pivotal role of his works within the artistic landscape of America. Schuyff’s work has recently been shown at Mary Boone Gallery (NYC), Sorry we are closed/ Sebastien Janssen (Brussels) and has upcoming solo shows at Fri Art, Kunsthalle Fribourg (Switzerland) Fundation Vasarely (Aix-en-Provence) en Le Consortium (Dijon).