David Novros – Portable Murals

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For the Portable Murals show, held at the Thomas Brambilla Gallery, four large modular canvas and four working drawings that best express the Artist’s poetics will be exhibited.

Novros’ monochromatic and irregular canvas are, in fact, composed by a variety of thick layers of acrylic paint and enameled pigments of Murano, contributing in creating a kinesthetic visual experience through the bright canvas’ response to the changing light.

As often pointed out by Novros himself, his work is strongly influenced by a variety of historical and artistic sources: from the Paleolithic cave paintings, to the Byzantine mosaics and Longobardian goldsmithing, to the tradition of the renowned Italian frescoes, up to the large-scaled mural paintings by Barnett Newmann and Mark Rothko. Such specific references encouraged the Artist to become closer to the fresco and mural paintings techniques, leading him into choosing arid and pure colors typical of the Renaissance frescos. Novros longed for the creation of an artwork that could break through the pictorial space restricted by the canvas, in order to include its surrounding architectural context. The Artist therefore created what he defines as “portable walls”, namely canvas formed by a number of geometrical yet irregular panels and large empty spaces, which create negative physical spaces by letting the observer glimpse at the wall beneath. These revolutionary artworks influenced numerous contemporary artists and, in particular, Novros’ friend and colleague Brice Marden during the Seventies.

Nonetheless, differently from other artists who created irregularly shaped canvas, Novros’ works emphasize the critical meeting point between the canvas and the wall, as if his paintings were extensions of the walls themselves.