Installation View
Primary is pleased to present “Impressions of our Landscape”, an exhibition of new paintings by Magnus Sodamin, the artist’s third solo show with the gallery.
Influenced by a lifetime of open-air exploration, this new body of work focuses on the diverse 83 acres of the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, the artist’s year long residency at the Deering Estate and a period of research at the Artist in Residency in Everglades (AIRIE) program.
Reminiscent of impressionist methods, the paintings act as windows into the quiet solitude of nature. In recognition of time and beauty, Sodamin depicts a world overflowing with lavish flora, where light acts as an element of change, encouraging the viewer to honor our natural surroundings now before the moment is lost into an unfamiliar future
With this series, the artist has narrowed his subject matter to the commanding foliage of the Tropical monsoon climate. Captured on panel, these works highlight the various subtleties of nature before and after humankind and consider the many who dedicate their practices to the distribution, propagation, and curatorial of thousands of plants species into a single region or specific location. While elements of previous bodies of work remain integral, Sodamin pushes these paintings beyond his standard field of vision. Responding to the density of the surrounding vegetation, Sodamin interprets the intimate life of the lush greenery with a loosened brush stroke and a heavier texture.
Although the paintings directly acknowledge a history associated with the Tropical landscape of southern Florida, Sodamin’s work transcends locality. These works reach out to a broader scope, from the inquisitive explorer to the novice urban botanist. Bursts of radiant color flanked by ominous tones of green draw the viewer into Sodamin’s microcosm. In celebration of tribal mark making and naturally occurring patterns, the observable layerings are tactile, impasto applications of acrylic that elegantly trail across the work like hallucinations from “behind the looking glass”. As the colors and textures combine into one unified vision, Sodamin affirms his dedication to the heritage of painting and reminds the viewer of the simple beauties that dominate the most complex realities our delicate world has to offer.
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About Magnus Sodamin
Magnus Sodamin (b. 1987, Manhattan) uses an expanded painting practice that is at once hallucinatory and precise, employing a variety of techniques to blur the frontier between abstraction and landscape painting. His singular installations often begin with painting the walls and floors of an exhibition space with vibrant splashes of color, and then installing the space with similarly emotive, yet complementary canvas or panel compositions. The result is entirely immersive. Sodamin attended the New World School of the Arts (BFA, 2012) as well as the Nansen Academy in Lillehammer, Norway. He has exhibited in Norway and the United States, showing work at the 2012 BFA Exhibition held at the Cisneros-Fontanals art foundation (CIFO), the 2010 Lotus House Women’s Shelter Fundraiser at the Margulies Collection, a two consecutive solo exhibits at PRIMARY in 2014 / 2015. He has been in residence at the Deering Estate (2014), the Museums Quartier Residency, Vienna (2015), and Summit AIR, Eden, UTAH . Sodamin lives and works in Miami, where he is represented by PRIMARY.
on Instagram : @magnificentmagnus
