NIGEL BUXTON – Folds & Shadows – 7-31 May 2024

In this colourful exhibition Nigel Buxton presents paintings in the tradition of trompe l’oeil. These works, at first glance, persuade us to accept illusion. Paint modelled on flat surface tricks us, for a moment, into believing we see drapery in three dimensions. The flops and folds of fabric curve sensuously in and out of shadow or march with forthright authority across the picture plane.
In some of the smaller works Buxton has painted the illusion of an ornate gilded frame – a visual pun. One of these, frames a rendition of Hans Memling’s Madonna.  Leonardo da Vinci’s Madonna and her angel also appear, as if whispering either side of a drape. And in another small work a pair of young sisters, again extracted from Memling, are posed in front of a window which reveals a Mackenzie Country landscape.
But it is drapery which dominates this exhibition of lush oils. These paintings are sometimes flaglike, sometimes carnivalesque, all have great rhythm.