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Russ Warren: The Disciple
6 March, 2021 - 16 May, 2021
Read Sarah Sargent’s review in C-ville here.
The Disciple, 2020. Acrylic on canvas,72 x 48″
Dr. Fauci, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 72 x 48″
Pineapple Ascending, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Bounty at Wolf Trap, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Oh, Tamayo!, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Two Guitars, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Guitars and a Ten Cent Moon, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Cognin, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Queen Anne’s Revenge, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Deep into August, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, triptych, 60 x 120″
I Dreamed of Zeke and Sisyphus, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Guitar and Lutes, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Artist Outstanding in his Field, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
Two Houston Rodeo Clowns Meet on the Yellow Brick Road, 2020. Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 40″
CXII, 2020. Ink, livestock marker, oil stick, scraper on paper, 30 x 22″ Sold
CIX, 2020. Ink, livestock marker, oil stick, scraper on paper, 30 x 22″
CVIII, 2020. Ink, livestock marker, oil stick, scraper on paper, 30 x 22″
CVII, 2020. Ink, livestock marker, oil stick, scraper on paper, 30 x 22″
CIV, 2020. Ink, livestock marker, oil stick, scraper on paper, 30 x 22″. Sold
From the Sketchbooks, 1/28/18. India ink on paper, 6 x 8″
From the Sketchbooks, 11/21/17. India ink on paper, 6 x 8″ Sold
Les Yeux du Monde is honored to present Russ Warren: The Disciple from March 6 – May 16, 2021. This show features a series of large vertical diptychs that pay homage to other artists Warren admires and has studied through the years, from the Spanish master Pablo Picasso and the Oaxacan Rufino Tamayo to his former teacher at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Earl Staley. Picasso inspired Warren’s larger than life “combines” merging several facial profiles into one; Tamayo, the magical creatures, and Staley—with whom Warren also exhibited in an early site specific show in Beaumont TX in 1976 and in the 1984 Venice Biennale—stoked Warren’s work ethic and insatiable curiosity and study of other great artists’ works.
This selection of paintings will include large 78 x 42” verticals he began in the garage, when he grew out of his studio over the W.G. Clark designed Les Yeux du Monde gallery. He continued the same unique vertical diptych format when he moved in April 2020 into his new studio space designed by Josh Stastny (and built by Peter Johnson Builders), tackling some timely subjects, one of which was an over-life-sized “portrait” celebrating Dr. Anthony Fauci and a triptych, Deep into August, the title evoking the seemingly endless and strange nature of “time” during the ongoing pandemic. Warren evokes the fiery hellish spaces of anguish in the side panels of this triptych, yet, as is often the case with Warren’s work, humor and hope reign in its central panel. Other paintings like Pineapple Ascending, Bounty at Wolf Trap and his dancing and levitating guitars are hopeful images of resurrection after struggle and pain.
The show will include smaller works on paper in livestock marker, oil and acrylic and it will be accompanied by a new book of Warren’s poetry, also entitled The Disciple.
Numerous exhibitions, reviews and articles chronicle Warren’s artistic journey from his early days in Houston, Albuquerque and San Antonio through his widely and internationally exhibited Neo Expressionist work of the 1980s and his continued probing and artistic innovating of the following decades evident in his 2015 Survey exhibition Russ Warren:Works. The Disciple reveals an artist wrestling with the greats, just as Picasso did throughout his oeuvre, but also still striving and surprising with his own unique language and contributions, a master to be studied as well.
