David Asher Brook
Eudaimonia
28 June – 30 July 2023
Opening | Wednesday 28 June, 6-8pm
Fox Galleries presents artist David Asher Brook for his debut solo exhibition of fiercely intricate paintings titled ‘Eudaimonia’; and it is full of vitality.
His paintings are mosaic encounters that conjure the awe of life through his complex placement of dots and strokes, weaving philosophical thought, figuration and concurrence with historically built structures.
The Eudaimonic state is a devotion to the full picture.
All of the tiny pieces come together to inform an integrated painting, with the same sense of both wholeness and disparity that it took to create. The concept of Eudaimonia dates back to the 4th century BCE, with Aristotle’s proposal that flourishing comes from deriving purpose in accordance with virtue. These are the textural emotions that arrive through the acted experience. The pathways can be prickly, but through structure, comes harmony. One dot at a time.
Fleeting and yet abundant in the permanence of the painted object; Brook paints the rhythm, potential and abounding gesture that gives an impression of spontaneity. David Asher Brook reminds us that this in process is where to search for beauty, to explore the edges of our shadows and to take what author Ben Okri describes as ‘mental flight’.
How far can the neo-impressionist ‘dot’ take us? The dot is divisionist, satisfied in labour, elbowed in archetypes of Rock Art, Judeo-Christian, Byzantine and impressionist art; experimenting with the all-over optical interplay. Each mark is an act of devotion and celebration to the perception that by value in process; space and time are boundless.
Artists statement:
Painting is not about trying to make things that look good.
Why I paint has to do with everything that goes on in the psychology of action and potential.
Having guts, understanding when you should have pulled back.
Wanting more, wanting less.
Battling with the reality of the sunken cost, the unidirectional nature.
Anticipation, regret, unexpected surprise.
Self-worth, confidence, failing, completeness, acceptance.
Honing in on a platonic dream.
The closest possible interplay with materiality.
This is the medium in which I best experience these things.
DAVID ASHER BROOK
was born in Australia, with a mixed heritage of Iraqi, Singaporean and English. He is distinguished by a diverse visual language of painting, tapestry and video art. He is a qualified Stonemason and Heritage Conservationist from the Sydney University School of Architecture.
Asher Brook is philosophical in approach, referencing the human condition. He is a four time finalist in the NSW Parliament Plein Air Painting Prize, finalist in The Blake Prize, Salon des Refuses, Paddington Art Prize and the Brett Whiteley Travelling Artist Scholarship. He was the winner of the 2010 Waverley Art Oil Painting Prize and 2016 Eva Breuer Memorial Prize.
For John Cruthers, Sydney based art advisor, curator, writer and collector, David Asher Brooks´ work has …qualities deeper than technique, such as sensibility, attitude and heart. And I think this is what is special about David´s painting. In fact, what is special about David´s painting is David – his life, his thoughts, his feelings – and his willingness to share these with us in the paintings… they breathe love, wonder, tenderness, abandon, compassion, loss – and faith. ( John Cruthers 2019).
