NATIONALE

In Amy Bay’s debut solo exhibition at Nationale, sets of “twinned” paintings are close yet not quite identical—their similarities only serve to highlight their differences. In Tis the Last Rose of Summer, and Left Blooming Alone, emerald foliage and wine-colored vines echo each other across the two canvases. A cloud of pink flowers wraps around the pictures’ edges, revealing a quasi-photographic haze that evokes a distant landscape. The typically static and repetitive patterns that Bay uses as reference points, many derived from antique wallpaper and textiles, become subtly animated and hint at hidden depths behind their flat surfaces.

Join us for an artist talk with the incredible and learn more about her unique painting process and the histories behind her images of flowers, this Thursday, July 6th at 5pm at Nationale.

See Amy Bay’s floral twins in the last week of her show, They Always Have, and Still Do, on view through July 9.

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The glowing compositions in California-based artist Dennis Foster’s “Wake Up New” evoke the feeling of “driving along the coastal regions of Ventura and Northern Malibu outside of Los Angeles,” where “if traveling in the evening time, in the right direction, one can follow the sun falling until it finally rests.”
Paintings like “Comes and Goes,” featured here, suggest travel through time and landscapes, through crisp geometric shapes and saturated, matte colors.

, “Comes and Goes,” 2023, Flashe and acrylic on canvas, 20 x 16 inches

DM for an updated checklist. The exhibition is on view in the Project Room through August 20, 2023❗️

Inspiring studio visit with gallery artist Francesca Capone last week 🪡
Always a treat spending time with you, , and plotting the future together.
Don’t miss three new pieces from her series, “A Mother’s Discourse” debuting this Sunday in Los Angeles at in the group exhibition, MOTHER ✨

The subjects of the paintings in Amy Bay’s “They Always Have, and Still Do” are nominally flowers. But perhaps they should instead be called florals: decorative interpretations of plants’ reproductive structures, designed to march across walls and textiles in an infinitely repeatable grid. In Bay’s work, the floral pattern is granted autonomy from this rigid system— tendrils curling around the canvas and petals pressed against each other as they crowd inside their frames. Apparent symmetry is undermined in sets of “twinned” paintings, like “a rose is a” and “rose is a,” whose mirrored compositions only serve to highlight their differences. Bay’s use of classical oil painting techniques like imprimatura, glazing, and sgraffito adds complexity to subjects that would conventionally be depicted through restrained colors and simplified lines. What began as flat wallpaper starts to hint at depth, opening into hazy landscape-like spaces, with heavily textured surfaces that evoke the accumulation of emotion, memory, and tradition through decades of life.

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rose is a, 2022, oil on canvas, 10 x 9 inches

a rose is a, 2022, oil on canvas, 10 x 9 inches

Open 12-6pm this weekend, then back on Thursday!

LAST DAYS!

Kyle Lee’s paintings are windows into quietly profound moments—listening to music alone late at night by the light of the city streets, or contemplating a blank canvas in the studio, wondering what to paint next. Sometimes it feels important to let nothing happen for a little while. 🌃

Overture, 2022, acrylic and gouache on canvas, 15 x 14 inches

I’m Just Hanging Out by Myself, 2022, acrylic, gouache, and Flashe on canvas, 20.75 x 20 inches

Take a moment to come see ’s show Mini Hangs, in the Project Room through Sunday, June 18. DM for availability 💙