shop
News
SFAQ Picks: Libby Black // A Light That Never Goes Out
May 19, 2016
A LIGHT THAT NEVER GOES OUT, LIBBY BLACK AT GALLERY 16, SAN FRANCISCO
Libby Black featured on OUT.com
May 17, 2016
Libby Black featured on OUT.com, Need to Know: Artist Libby Black’s Faux-Mo World!
Hi Fructose: Jason Middlebrook’s Striking Geometric Paintings on Wood Planks
April 28, 2016
Jason Middlebrook’s Striking Geometric Paintings on Wood Planks
Check out the High Fructose article on Jason Middlebrook's current show, The Small Spaces in Between.
Gallery 16 @ Art Market San Francisco
April 11, 2016
Location: Fort Mason Center – Festival Pavilion
2 Marina Blvd.
San Francisco, CA 9412
Hours:
Benefit Preview
Wednesday, April 27, 2016
6:00pm to 9:00pm
Art Party
Thursday, April 28, 2016
6:00pm to 10:00pm
Public Hours
Friday, April 29, 2016 — 11:00am to 7:00pm
Saturday, April 30, 2016 — 11:00am to 7:00pm
Sunday, May 1, 2016 — 12:00pm to 6:00pm
For information and tickets, visit artmarketsf.com
Josh Jefferson in the May Issue of Juxtapoz
April 07, 2016
https://www.juxtapoz.com/news/magazine/josh-jefferson-the-right-strokes-make-the-right-folks/
Get your copy of the May 2016 issue of Juxtapoz and read about Josh Jefferson making "perfect strokes."
Quartz: Climate change is making California look like another planet
March 31, 2016
SFAQ Picks: Jason Middlebrook @Gallery 16 →
March 29, 2016
THE SMALL SPACES IN BETWEEN, JASON MIDDLEBROOK AT GALLERY 16, SAN FRANCISCO
Jason Middlebrook's The Small Spaces in Between is SFAQ's pick for the week.
Thomas Heinser Reduziert Press recap
March 18, 2016
Thomas Heinser's solo exhibition Reduziert received a significant amount of international press.
Here's a recap of a few recent articles.
- Core 77: Thomas Heinser's Aerial Images Show Us a Startling View of California's Drought
- Curbed SF: Last Chance to See Traumatic But Beautiful California Landscapes Warped by Drought
- Wired: The Most Surreal Look at California’s Drought Is From the Air
- Daily Mail: Aerial Photos Reveal California's Landscape Devastated By Drought
Josh Jefferson featured on the cover of New American Paintings Issue #122
February 26, 2016
Excited to announce that Josh Jefferson is featured on the cover of New American Paintings Issue #122. Congrats Josh!
Cover of Issue #122 of New American Paintings
Josh Jefferson’s “Head Into the Trees” reviewed in Artillery Magazine
February 26, 2016
JOSH JEFFERSONGallery 16 / San Francisco
Human beings are genetically programmed to respond positively to the face, no doubt a survival instinct, as babies bond with their nurturing parents. Perhaps not coincidentally a fairly recent dad himself, Boston-based Josh Jefferson has tapped into this universal attraction, with an exhibition titled “Head Into The Trees” at Gallery 16.
Having taken up painting a mere three years ago, his work has been gaining momentum in the art world, and notably has been getting a boost from his social-media presence. Also a noted avant-garde jazz saxophonist, Jefferson takes the notion of “portraiture” as a point of departure for a variety of unusual works on paper and canvas in which simplified faces, heads and botanical organisms mesh and morph into one another. An abstracted, rather amoeba-like tree shape recurs in many of the works including the trio Little Blue Tree (2015), Blue Tree (2015) and Tree #5 (2015) hanging together on one wall. In Little Blue Tree, the cobalt form stands out on a brilliant gold background; Jefferson, one may learn, is actually largely color-blind, and these dramatic chromatic shifts work well for him because he can see them clearly, whereas ones with more subtle variations in hue may evade his range of color perception—pink, apparently, appearing gray, or vice versa.
Josh Jefferson, Blue Tree, 2015
Along the adjacent wall are four paintings on black backgrounds, in which the “tree” form meshes with a head.Hair Tree Top (2015), a smaller work, has a roughly half-circular base in sea-foam green marked with gray, black, red and blue; the top is a blob-like crimson red form overlaid with wide brushy strokes in electric blue, suggesting hair. Depicting heads, a dozen small collages and mixed-media works on paper hang nearby in two rows of six. These feel more contemplative and have greater compositional complexity than the paintings. Untitled Head #4 (2014) uses crayons, ink and gouache on vintage paper. The nose and mouth of this head are formed by a dull green shape suggesting a frog. With rudimentary indications of features and loose interpretations of anatomy, Jefferson draws from the Cubist tradition, along with art of so-called “primitive” cultures that inspired it, as well as a childlike, cartoon-related aesthetic more closely akin to Philip Guston and his many disciples.
Jefferson’s studio practice is one of prolific creation, often including the recycling of earlier works as collage elements, with the editing process taking place later on. He is drawn to work which appears effortless, and this attraction to ease of execution and an unfiltered, deliberate process of mark-making is clearly felt. With tens of thousands of Instagram followers, his boldly graphic and accessible work clearly appeals to a broad range of people. Whether pulled by our collective responsiveness to human physiognomy, or by their often bright, attractive colors, these quirky works have a definite appeal. At the same time, provocative questions of how social media increasingly shapes and informs our perceptions of contemporary culture also emerge.