Hilo Chen
Figures on the Beach - New Paintings
4 - 27 March 2010
Frank Bernarducci and Louis K. Meisel are pleased to announce the solo exhibition of Photorealist painter, Hilo Chen. Chen continues to reference his earlier and most well known series of paintings, "The Beach Series," created after his first visit to an American resort after moving here from Taiwan in 1968. It was with this series that Chen began to focus on the female figure in his work. This exhibition features several new works continuing in the tradition of his beach paintings.
In addition to his early "Beach Series," Chen went on to create the "Bedroom Series," and in 1976, "The Bathroom Series," which established him as one of the world's most preeminent contemporary painters of the nude. During the 1980s and 90s, Chen continued to exhibit in the United States, Europe and Taiwan, however he did not produce any new figurative work. He chose instead to explore and experiment with new techniques such as a combination of both airbrush and brush. Chen reemerged in the new millennium with several new paintings, reminiscent of iconic Pop images and referencing his early “Beach Series.” He continues to work in this style today.
Chen’s paintings are best known for their bright, vivid colors, and Pop style patterns on swimsuits. In Beach 163, Chen portrays a woman lying on her side in a hot pink bikini. This is a classic example of Chen’s ability to magnify the dominant figure, whilst creating much more ‘soft-focus’ figures in the background as seen in many of his beach paintings. He often focuses on a fragment of the female form as seen in Beach 162 and Beach 161, confronting the viewer with an immediate focal point. The bronzed bodies of Chen’s figures on the beach are often nude, or in the case of Beach 162 and Beach 161, somewhat exposed from their swimsuits. Chen’s canvases seem to radiate with heat due to his uncanny ability to capture flesh tones as well as the single drops of water that rest across each tanned female figure. Suggestive, yet restrained, Chen’s canvases speak more to the sexual freedom and admiration of the female form as opposed to the exploitation. His paintings are reminiscent of the hot days of summer, yet veiled with nostalgia for the era of Pop imagery.
