Anne Vieux’s (b. 1985) body of work copes with the ideas of polychromatic abstractions and perceptions of spatial ambiguity. The New York-based painter pays attention to strikingly abstracted compositions, plunging the eye into a narcotic viewing that flirts with the concept of illusion. Her paintings’ subject matter express a colourful and explosive character projecting a vibrant mesh-work of uncanny shapes all swirling around. Light and its reflections play a major role as they are capable of shaping a multifaceted point of view while observing the surface of her artworks. Vieux is keen on digitally manipulated images after being artistically and technically developed by the artist. She creates “source imagery by scanning holographic paper then pushing the limits of the image data through zooming, warping, and drawing on my computer”, as she says in her own words.
Words: Yannis Kostarias
Additionally, “the manipulated JPGs are then printed onto fabric ground, where final alterations are built up through layers of airbrushed acrylic paint and matte medium gel”. With frisky wit, she produces innovative art pieces of luminescence, presenting computer-based paintings formed by alluring and creative rigour, full of an optical opulence and multicoloured depth. The paintings also contain the artist’s further painterly additions underlining the dual character of her work. Sometimes it seems rather hard to distinguish the difference between what it is painted and what is printed. Last year, I caught myself thinking about this visual trick in Vieux’s paintings at the Annka Kultys gallery in London. Both art techniques deserve an equal read as they both contribute to the painting outcome.
Her works interestingly seem able to capture an alternative concept of spatiality in correlation with the light. Vieux’s depictions build tangled spatial mirrored visualisations that diffuse, channel and reflect the light’s effects and imitations. Besides the static dimension of the work, its illusionist depth employs tricks to the eye through dynamic forms; manifold layers of shapes transmitting rainbows of colours. Her work also highlights an increased sense of artistic spontaneity and alluring randomness, which renders a distinctive character in her pieces. By creating such ambience, the artist invites the viewer to experience a luminous virtual reality captured on a painted space of the canvas. Her dream of space-like quality constructs a unique imagery that does not actually present a particular form or feature; on the contrary, it invokes different feelings and provides more room for interpretation.
Born in Michigan in 1985, Anne Vieux lives and works in New York. She received her MFA from the Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2016 and her BFA in Painting and Art History at the Kansas City Art Institute in 2009. The American artist’s work has been exhibited in many galleries across the United States, such as New York, Chicago, New Jersey, Philadelphia and Los Angeles, and also in London, United Kingdom. She had an art residency at the Mana Contemporary in 2016, she won the artist fellowship emergency grant in New York and was also awarded the Grellner Scholarship: OX-Bow Residency.
In her interview with Art Verge, Anne Vieux shares her approach on her alluring compositions and other art issues, while providing some important insights about her daily life. Check it out!
http://annevieux.com/
Art Verge: Can you tell us about the process of making your work?
Anne Vieux: I create source imagery by scanning holographic paper then pushing the limits of the image data through zooming, warping, and drawing on my computer. The manipulated JPGS are then printed onto fabric ground, where final alterations are built up through layers of airbrushed acrylic paint and matte medium gel.
AV: How would you define your work in few words (ideally in 3 words)?
Anne Vieux: Assiduous, feminine, narcotic.
AV: Can you name any artists you, lately or generally, take inspiration from?
Anne Vieux: I have so many, I find this hard to answer. Lynda Benglis, Beverly, Fishman, Anni Albers, Polly Apfelbaum, Katharina Grosse, Kerstin Bratsch.
AV: Creating a new painting can be a solitary process. If this applies to you, when you concentrate on a new artwork does it affect your social life at all?
Anne Vieux: My social life is affected in general. I mostly make time for experiences that feed my work.
AV: How do you know when an artwork is finished?
Anne Vieux: There’s a moment when I find myself looking back into the work, like a feedback loop. I get absorbed and excited to see it over and over.
AV: What about the place where you work? What’s your studio space like, and how does it affect your process?
Anne Vieux: I have a space where I can look at multiple paintings at once. I make a giant mess of tape and paint that I clean up daily. It’s important for me to start the day with everything in its place.
AV: Which exhibition did you visit last?
Anne Vieux: Signe Pierce at New Release Gallery and Gregory Caliche at Signal Gallery.
AV: What do you hope audiences will take from your work?
Anne Vieux: I keep that part of it open, but perhaps something in between a kind of technological beauty and cerebral thought.
AV: What does your mum think about your art?
Anne Vieux: Lately she likes it, I think.
AV: Are you a morning person or a night owl?
Anne Vieux: I am the most productive in the morning, so I attempt to be a morning person.
AV: Is the glass half empty or half full?
Anne Vieux: I tend to go back and forth but mostly half empty. I think it makes room for growth, but I try to touch base with half full often.
AV: Which are your plans for the near future?
Anne Vieux: I’ll have some work at Art Brussels and then a show at Annka Kultys
gallery this fall.
One thought on “Anne Vieux Stages Narcotic Visualizations Within A Capturing Optical Opulence”