Corey Helford Gallery Presents Lauren Marx (12/14-1/18)
Chimera
OPENING RECEPTION
December 14, 2019 | 7pm - 11pm
ON VIEW
December 14 – January 18, 2019
Downtown Los Angeles’ Corey Helford Gallery is proud to announce a solo show and largest body of work to date from St. Louis-based artist Lauren Marx, entitled Chimera, opening December 14th in Gallery 2.
Marx creates beautiful vignettes that speak to the cycle of life. Combining pen and ink with various mixed media, her paintings offer a raw depiction of birth and death. Influenced by scientific illustrations and the Baroque period, Marx presents these cyclical phenomena in visually appealing ways, often fusing the chaotic elements of nature into stylized compositions with an emphasis on design. Longtime fans will find similar themes from past works but on a larger scale imbued with complexity. A clear demarcation from her old works but an in-between stage for her promising future works, styles, and concepts.
Regarding her new body of work Chimera (Greek mythology meaning “a fire-breathing female monster with a lion's head, a goat's body, and a serpent's tail”), Marx shares, “I’m combining my previous themes and concepts of fauna representations of emotions, personal mental health, family, and self in an effort to begin creating a mythological world, centered around North American flora and fauna, to better expresses my image of who I am, how I am perceived, my struggles with mental health, and to explore self-healing.”
Says Marx, “In my 2016 show, Flesh Blood Bone, I used fawns as a symbol for both myself and my sister and the use of whitetail fawns in this series is a call-back to those artworks, with the speckled fawn being a representation of my more natural chaotic self. Many of the other animals depicted in my ‘chimeras’ were previously illustrated in a series where they were haloed ‘saints’ used as symbolic stand-ins for various strong emotional states. I combined these ideas in the Chimera body of work to create a variety of self-portraits that, with their different bodies and heads, have the ability to interact with their world in different ways. Much like how our current mental states can alter how we interact with our world in our daily lives.
In these art pieces, I reference scientific illustration and religious symbolism, which are common themes in my past artworks. In a few pieces, I set about challenging myself with scale and complexity to see where I might want to take my art in the future. I see this series of pieces as an in-between stage between my old and future works, styles, and concepts.”
Chimera opens Saturday, December 14th from 7:00pm-11:00pm in Gallery 2, alongside the sixth annual Art Collector Starter Kit VI group show (featuring new 12” x 12” works by over 100 artists) in the Main Gallery and a four-artist show with Bao Pham, kelogsloops, Sasha Ira, and Josh Tiessen in Gallery 3. Corey Helford Gallery is located at 571 S. Anderson St. Los Angeles, CA 90033 and normal hours are Tuesday – Saturday, from 12pm - 6pm.
About Lauren Marx:
St. Louis, Missouri-based artist Lauren Marx explores the intricate process of decay with her surreal and often grotesque drawings and paintings. Animals become enmeshed in each other’s flesh as tendons and sinew rip apart, exposing their innards. While the subject matter often triggers an initial reaction of repulsion, Marx’s ornate line work and graceful compositions are pleasing to the eye. “Animals always have been, and always will be, my passion. They have been the subjects of my drawings ever since I was a child. I blame it on weekends spent at the Saint Louis Zoo and endless hours watching National Geographic’s Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. They influenced my desire to learn about biology while attending high school. While in high school, I began collecting bones, feathers, and books. Over these past few years, my passion grew to zoology, cosmology, and mythology. In the spring of 2012, I finally combined my obsessions into one drawing, titled “Galactic Collision,” and the theme surrounding that piece has been the focus of my work ever since.
About Corey Helford Gallery:
Corey Helford Gallery (CHG) was first established in 2006 by Jan Corey Helford and her husband, television producer and creator, Bruce Helford (The Conners, Anger Management, The Drew Carey Show, George Lopez) and has since evolved into one of the premier galleries of New Contemporary art. Its goals as an institution are the support and growth of young and emerging, to well-known and internationally established artists.
CHG represents a diverse collection of international artists, primarily influenced by today’s pop culture and collectively encompassing style genres such as New Figurative Art, Pop Surrealism, Neo Pop, Graffiti and Street Art. CHG is located in Downtown Los Angeles in a robust 12,000 square foot building presenting new exhibitions approximately every six weeks.
For more info and an upcoming exhibition schedule, visit CoreyHelfordGallery.com and connect on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
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