Flirtation, at its best, is suggestive yet ambiguous, bold yet reticent, playful yet pregnant with meaning. The titular tease in “The Flirt,” Joshua Petker’s new exhibition, may be one of the figures depicted in the twelve dichromatic paintings, but the show’s title could just as easily describe the artist and his fertile imagination.Petker’s elaborate tableaux of social activity feature libertines, musicians, and fair maidens. In one of the larger canvases on display, Pleading in Blue (all works 2021), a man converses with a woman seated in a chair, while two abstracted apparitions shroud the
The Flirt: A Conversation With Joshua Petker
Anat Ebgi // May 01, 2021 - June 05, 2021
April 28, 2021 | in Painting
It s hard to believe it s been 9 years since we last featured the works by Joshua Petker, but that fact makes it even sweeter to see him back in the spotlight with a solo debut at Anat Ebgi. Opening on May 1st,
The
Flirt will be revealing the latest body of work that Los Angeles-based artist has been developing in the past year or so, producing one of his most consistent and coherent bodies of work to date.
Over the years Petker has been exploring his practice and technique using the collage-like approach to composition and building of the image. Overlapping with each other and nonconforming to the laws of physics, the casts of characters and elements would often merge inside puzzling, often apparition-like scenes. Yet, in the past year or so his focus narrowed down along with his vibrant color palette, evoking to some extent the uncertainty and deceleration