Press Release
| Simon Keenleyside & Richard Moon | Primeval |
| Exhibition Dates: Thursday 29 July – Sunday 8 August 2021 |
| CHARLIE SMITH LONDON is delighted to introduce Simon Keenleyside and Richard Moon in ‘Primeval’ at 28 Shelton St, Covent Garden, London. Combining the finely painted monochromatic figuration of Richard Moon with Keenleyside’s vividly fluorescent landscapes, the exhibition explores nostalgia, the mythological and the uncanny. Simon Keenleyside is known for his vibrantly incandescent landscapes that are both dreamlike and hallucinogenic. Returning to the same location repeatedly, Keenleyside embraces the familiar whilst searching for difference within it. He looks to uncover the strange and unfamiliar, navigating a course between the sublime and the uncanny, but also beauty. As the artist states: “I want a sense of complicated beauty that is not just seductive or elegant but one that is fraught with anxiety and desires.” Evoking mystery and wonderment by way of higher reality, Keenleyside paints topologies that are both physical places and psychical states. Richard Moon’s paintings explore nostalgia and its tendency to alter the factual recollection of memory—clouding it with selective interpretations and ultimately distortions of truth. Largely painted in the monochromatic hues of vintage photography (itself a subject and aid to nostalgia), Moon’s paintings evoke periods in history that in turn might suggest specific events. Subjects include politically loaded flags such as the American Confederate flag; broken porcelain figures; hybrid creatures with human heads; and still lives with subtle but incongruous gothic motifs sewn into the tablecloth. In combination, Moon’s paintings weave their way through historical, mythological and political implications, questioning the very notion of truth and whether we can ever really be certain of a concrete, stable reality. Together, Keenleyside and Moon invite us towards an unworldly territory that originates in reality, but which is sublimated through two very specific lenses. They are primal visions that confront us with otherness, timelessness and absence. |
Biography | Simon Keenleyside
| Born: 1975 | ||
| EDUCATION | ||
| 2000- 2002 | MA Painting | Royal College of Art, London |
| 1997-2000 | BA (Hons) Fine Art Painting | Brighton University, Sussex |
| ONE PERSON EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2015 | Mural | Wall Works, Suffolk |
| 2013-14 | Back to the World | Blindarte Contemporanea, Naples |
| 2010 | Magic lurks | Rokeby, London |
| 2010 | Safe in the magic of my world | Blindarte Contemporanea, Naples |
| 2008 | A place in the darkness | Rokeby, London |
| 2007 | The Uninhabited | Blindarte Contemporanea, Naples |
| 2006 | Endless Coloured Days | Mogadishni, Copenhagen |
| 2006 | Dreams by the sea | Rokeby, London |
| 2006 | MiArt 2006 | Studio d’Arte Cannaviello, Milan |
| 2005 | No life in the land | Studio d’Arte Cannaviello, Milan |
| 2004 | Rainbows In Dark Places | Mogadishni, Copenhagen |
| 2003 | Digging and Daydreams | Standpoint Gallery, London |
| 2002 | The Parched Field, Emerging Artist Award | BOC Headquarters, Surrey |
| SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2021 | Primeval | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2020 | Accelerate Your Escape | Whitechapel Gallery, London |
| 2020 | Winter Show | Galleri Christoffer Egelund, Copenhagen |
| 2020 | PROJECT PAPYROPHILIA | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2019 | 10 years | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2018 | Summertime 2018 | Galleri Christoffer Egelund, Copenhagen |
| 2017 | Natura Plastica | Blindarte, Milan |
| 2016 | New Works | Brighton Arts Festival, Brighton |
| 2016 | Saltmarsh | Maeldune Heritage Centre, Maldon, Essex |
| 2015 | Mario Bertolini Collection | The Museo del Novecento, Milan |
| 2013 | Collective Mural | St Nicolas School, London |
| 2012 | Copenhagen Art Woodcuts | Kant Gallery, Copenhagen |
| 2012 | Everything Everyday | Blindarte, Naples |
| 2012 | Inshore-fishing | Rokeby, London |
| 2011 | Pulsed | ASC Gallery, London |
| 2009 | New Works | Mogadishni, Copenhagen |
| 2009 | Glad to invite you | Mostra d’Oltremare, Naples |
| 2007 | Art Forum | Mogadishni Gallery, Berlin |
| 2007 | Bomberg Relevance | The Ben Uri London Jewish Museum of Art, London |
| 2007 | Is it a Pazziella? | Blindarte contemporanea, Capri |
| 2006 | Girl Power and Boyhood | Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh, Kunsthallen, Brandt, Denmark and Stavanger Kulturhus, Norway |
| 2006 | GO FIGURE | Mogadishni Gallery, Aarhus. |
| 2006 | Stilelibero 2 | Studio D’Art Cannaviello, Milan |
| 2006 | Broken Romanticism | Standpoint Gallery, London |
| 2006 | The Leisure Club | Blindarte Contemporanea, Naples |
| 2006 | RCA Secret | Royal College of Art, London |
| 2005 | PAINTINGS | Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo |
| 2005 | ARTfutures | Bloomberg Space, London |
| 2005 | Real Strange | Lounge Gallery, London |
| 2005 | New London Kicks | Wooster Projects, New York |
| 2005 | BLOC | County Hall Gallery, London. |
| 2005 | If You Go Down To The Woods Today… | Rockwell, London |
| 2005 | RCA Secret | Royal College of Art, London |
| 2005 | Naturally! | Mogadishni, Copenhagen |
| 2004 | Kettle’s Yard Open | Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge |
| 2004 | Forever Beautiful | Clapham Art Gallery, London |
| 2004 | Sixteen | Royal Bromton Hospital, London |
| 2004 | The Forest | Rockwell, London |
| 2004 | Lexmark European Final | Triennale di Milano, Milan |
| 2004 | Playing Dead | Long & Ryle Gallery, London |
| 2004 | The Cardboard Factory | MOGADISHNI, Copenhagen |
| 2004 | RCA Secret | Royal College of Art, London |
| 2003 | The Drawing Room | The Union, London |
| 2003 | The Rude Show | New Inn Gallery, London |
| 2003 | The Hunting Art Prizes 2003 | RCA, London |
| 2002 | The Commodity Show | The Loading Bay, Old Truman Brewery, London |
| 2002 | Come Again | Hockney Gallery, RCA, London |
| 2001 | Photosynthesis | Vertigo Gallery, London |
| 2001 | One Day All This Will Be Yours | Howie Street, RCA, London |
| 2001 | Group Show | Vertigo Gallery, London |
| 2001 | One Week Wonders | Vertigo Gallery, London |
| AWARDS | ||
| 2004 | Lexmark European Art Prize UK Winner (selected by Professor Brendan Neiland Meredith Etherington-Smith Christian Ward) | |
| 2002 | BOC Emerging Artist Award (selected by Sir Peter Blake RA, Matthew Collings, Andrew Hutchinson) | |
| 2000-2002 | TI Dowty Scholarship Award at the RCA | |
| COLLECTIONS | ||
| The Museo del Novecento Collection Amlyn Collection, London | ||
| Mario Bertolini Collection | ||
| Haldor Topsoe, Houston | ||
| Amlyn Collection, London | ||
| Jens-Peter Brask, Denmark | ||
| Stalke Galleri Collection, Denmark | ||
| Anette Reiter & Peter Skovborg, Denmark | ||
| BOC Collection, Surrey | ||
| TI Group, London | ||
| David Roberts Foundation, London | ||
| Comme des Garcon, New York | ||
| Edvin Blomqvist, Denmark | ||
| Kirsten & Stefan Mordorst, Denmark | ||
| Galerie Wolfsen, Aulberg | ||
| Sleth Modernism Architects, Arhus | ||
| Mario Testino, London | ||
| Marsh McLennan, London | ||
| RCA Painting Collection, London | ||
| Massimo Recine, Milan | ||
| Manfred Schierjott, Germany | ||
| Heather Hill Capital Holding, Denmark | ||
Biography | Richard Moon
| Richard Moon | ||
| Born: 1971 | ||
| EDUCATION | ||
| 2002-2005 | Post-Graduate Diploma Fine Art | Royal Academy Schools, London |
| 1999-2002 | BA (Hons) Painting (1st Class) | Camberwell College of Art, London |
| ONE PERSON EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2012 | Asa Nisi Masa | Rathbone Art Studios, London |
| 2010 | Plastic Time | Madder 139, London |
| 2007 | Kin | The Wyer Gallery, London |
| 2007 | The Tower | Klinkhammer Projects, Dusseldorf |
| 2006 | New Paintings | The Wyer Gallery, London |
| SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2021 | Primeval | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2019 | Etchings | Dekka-Arts, Margate |
| 2018 | Secret Charter | Dulwich Picture Gallery, London |
| 2018 | Artwave Festival 2018 | Lewes |
| 2017 | Chaos, Contrasts, Change | OHOS Gallery, Reading |
| 2016 | Fire and Water | OHOS Gallery, Reading |
| 2016 | After Realism | Gallerie im Gartenhaus (GiG), Munich |
| 2015 | Reconstructed Minds | Skipwiths, London |
| 2014 | Chinese Whispers | Gallerie Nasty Alice, Eindhoven |
| 2014 | DrAwn 2gether | Gig (Galerie I'm Gartenhaus), Munich |
| 2014 | Summer Exhibition | The Royal Academy of Arts, London |
| 2013 | Summer Exhibition | The Royal Academy of Arts, London |
| 2012 | Polemically Small | Orleans House Gallery, London |
| 2012 | Etchings | The Café Gallery, The Royal Academy of Arts, London |
| 2009 | New London School | Galerie Schuster, Berlin |
| 2008 | The Past is History (part 2) | Changing Role Gallery, Rome |
| 2008 | The Past is History (part 1) | Changing Role Gallery, Naples |
| 2008 | New London School | Mark Moore Gallery, Santa Monica |
| 2007 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT | Atlantis Gallery, London |
| 2007 | Salon Nouveau | Engholm Engelhorn Galerie, Vienna |
| 2006 | New London Kicks | Wooster Projects, New York |
| 2006 | John Moores 24 | The Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool |
| 2006 | The Celest Art Prize | The Truman Brewery, London |
| 2006 | New London Kicks | Soho House, New York |
| AWARDS | ||
| 2006 | Short-listed for John Moores 24 | |
| 2006 | Short-listed for Celeste Art Prize | |
| BIBLIOGRAPHY | ||
| 2013 | The Royal Academy of Arts Summer Show illustrated Catalogue…p.74 | |
| 2011 | Standing Grounded: Heidegger’s The Origin of the Work of Art and Contemporary Painting by Magdelena Wisnowska…p.69 to 89 | Aesthetic Pathways (volume 2, number 1) |
| 2011 | Dialogues (Richard Moon) p.16 | Notion Magazine (Issue no. 50) |
| 2009 | Collecting the Contemporary for Tomorrow (interview with Alison Myners) p.6 & 8 | AXA Art Review |
| 2009 | Exhibitions (review of The Golden Record Exhibition, Lincoln) 21st to 27th March 2009, p.39 2003. | The Guardian Guide |
| Art (review of Future Map 02 Exhibition, at the London Institute Gallery, p.55 | The Evening Standard Metro Life Magazine | |
| COLLECTIONS | ||
| Javier Baz, Denver | ||
| Saatchi Gallery, London | ||
| Paul and Alison Myners, London | ||
| Roger Taylor, London | ||