A Hug From The Art World is pleased to present Genre Paintings,
Pablo Barba’s second exhibition with the gallery.
The exhibition opens on Thursday, October 12th, with an opening celebration from 6 – 8 PM at A Hug From The Art World, 515 West 19th Street, New York, NY 10011 and will be on view through Saturday, November 11th. In this series of eight new paintings, begun in 2022, Barba continues to contextualize contemporary scenes in the tradition of petit genre painting. In portraying ordinary people engaged in common activities, genre painting (or petit genre) depicts aspects of everyday life and figures to whom no identity can be attached either individually or collectively, thus distinguishing it from history painting (or grand genre) and portraiture. These depictions can be realistic, imagined, or romanticized by the artist, while often employing familiar and frequently sentimental subject matter. In one painting, a woman, eyes closed, lies topless beside her swimming pool, reminiscent of a reclining Venus, as a pool boy working behind drags his net across the water’s surface. In another, a woman stands at her front door wearing a silk robe and nightgown, arms extended and a slight smile on her face, as she graciously accepts a delivery from the pizza guy. In another, a plumber lies on the ground supine, his hands attending to a pipe beneath the sink, while a woman in a floral dress leans against the kitchen counter above him, gazing down attentively. Other genre scenes included depict solo figures and small groups, at times addressing the viewer, one another, or the space between.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Born in 1985 in Santiago de Chile, Pablo Barba grew up in the Chile of the nineties, a time and place shaped by rapid change. As the country abruptly transitioned from a long-lasting dictatorship which had plunged its citizens into international and social isolation, the return to democracy was accompanied by the promises of consumer culture and the arrival of the World Wide Web. Barba came of age as an artist in a society that was eager to participate and connect on a global scale – and the Web became a portal through which to experience the rest of the world. In a country that had once been defined by limited access to information, he found himself mining the annals of art history and the Internet simultaneously. In his paintings, Barba combines classical tropes of figurative painting with gestures and themes drawn from contemporary digital culture.
Pablo Barba earned an MFA from Columbia University (2016), an MA from Universidad de Chile (2014), and a BFA from Universidad Catolica de Chile (2009). His work has been exhibited at Galería Animal, Galería BECH, and Galería Juan Egenau in Santiago; at The LeRoy Neiman Gallery, The Wallach Gallery at Columbia University, The Fisher-Landau Center for Art, and The Bronx Museum of the Arts in New York; and solo exhibitions in New York and Los Angeles. He lives and works in New York.