June 25 to July 31, 2021<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bradley Ertaskiran is pleased to present Still ready to curse and rage<\/em>, Preston Pavlis\u2019 first solo exhibition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Still ready to curse and rage<\/em> is a reflection on doubt, yearning and self-assurance. Through poetic associations across form and content, the nine works in the exhibition cycle between moments of troubled anguish and fleeting radiance. This exhibition marks the artist\u2019s continued interest in merging painting, textiles and collage, culminating in works that shift in scale and material presence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The title of the exhibition is a line from the poem \u201cThe Albuquerque Graveyard\u201d by American poet Jay Wright, in his book Soothsayers and Omens.<\/em> In the poem, Wright revisits a cemetery he has frequented for years. Passing the mounds of personal heroes and members of his own family, he searches the past for a resolution to his own internal conflicts. Again, his venture leaves him without answers to his position in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Similar to Wright\u2019s conviction towards introspection, Pavlis\u2019 work is rooted in the search for faithful expression through an inward gaze. This search often yields no definitive answers, as depicted in when the jig is up…<\/em> in which a dancer sits backstage before a mirror contemplating the validity of her artistic pursuits. Her reflection breaks away and implicates the viewer in this question, as weighted theatre curtains encroach on the scene. Impressions of the spiritual emerge in the work Inner life<\/em> where a man sits in a garden with a defiant confidence, surrounded by the blooming eyes of flowering hollyhocks. In Of opalescence<\/em>, pasted, sewn and quilted fabrics envelop the protagonist as butterflies emerge from her face. Here, personal transformation is a rapture, however her closed eyes hint that this may only be a dream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n