July 25th 2018

BEHIND THE SCENES:
KOEN VANMECHELEN
“It’s About Time”

July 4th 2018

BEHIND THE SCENES:
DAYDREAMING WITH STANLEY KUBRICK,
Exhibition at Somerset House, London

all posts title image
Robert Stone, In the studio, January 2022

BEHIND THE SCENES:
ROBERT STONE
Debut with Haines Gallery at FOG Design + Art 2022
San Francisco, CA

January 24th 2022

Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 36 inches

PART I

There is something reassuring about watching an artist develop in his craft; through long days and hours in the studio, technical mishaps, lost moments of doubt, quizzical self-anhiliating fear everything shows up one way or another. We have been working with Robert Stone for sometime, and the bi-weekly pleasure of visiting and talking in his studio thanks to FaceTime has been a journey like all creative roads. The part you need to know is that this new body of work made in a flurry of deadline pressure for Haines Gallery’s exhibition at FOG Design + Art 2022 in San Francisco last week, marks a new step in Stone’s practice. It is the first time he has worked small; the transition from large mural size commissions that fill new architect designed homes and apartments around the country to something discrete and concentrated raised a new set of questions for the artist. Set off a new range of misgivings and technical challenges. 

Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 36 inches
Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 48 inches

For a painter whose early history fell in the realm of design, moving to a full time life as a painter presented its fair amount of drama. But we can now safely say that he is fully present in these works in his early mid-career with assurance and power that makes these works sing all on their own. One after the next decries his unique way of layering a grid, lines, brush strokes through a prism of compressed space in a way we have never before seen. There is nothing that prepares you for originality except the sense of rightness you feel in your mind’s eye when you see the tension created by something magic and unusual, just hanging together as if by a serendipity like breath. His new paintings are a gift that have been long in their gestation, but here they are full-blown pageantry of planes and lines swimming through space. It is an exciting moment to take notice.

Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 48 x 36 inches
Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 48 x 36 inches (detail)

PART II

As described by Haines Gallery in their press material, Robert Stone (b. 1961, lives and works in San Francisco, CA) creates striking canvases that blur the boundaries between two-and three-dimensional space, precise production and expressive gesture.

Using customized, trowel-like brushes, Stone applies ridges of layered paint that catch the light, causing elements to advance and recede as viewers interact with the work. Rendered in a palette of blacks, whites, and greys, the interlocking geometric forms and lines give way to sheer passages of paint over poured resin and bare linen canvas, further animating the interplay of elements that comprise each dynamic work. In these complex compositions, layered, tactile geometries and intersecting planes guide the viewer through abstract, ambiguous spaces and structures.

Stone studied at Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA, and the San Francisco Art Institute, CA. His work has been included in group and solo exhibitions in San Francisco, where he lives and works, Los Angeles, and New York, and is in the collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 36 inches
Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 36 inches (detail)
Robert Stone, Untitled, 2022,
Acrylic and mixed media on linen-wrapped panel, 36 x 36 inches (detail)
Robert Stone, video in the studio, January 2022