JOHN NIEMAN
"The Wanted Show"
November 29th-December 17th, 2016
Opening Reception, Thursday, December 1st, 6-8 pm.
Chelsea, NYC: Viridian Artists is pleased to present "The Wanted Show", an exhibition of Wanted Posters by John Nieman. The exhibition continues from November 29th to December 17th, 2016 with an opening Reception, Thursday, December 1st, 6-8 pm.
What is missing in American Values? What is heroism? These important questions are answered in numerous ways by the artist John Nieman in this series of "Wanted Posters" describing outstanding individuals wanted and known for their positive virtues of generosity, sacrifice, leadership, and creativity rather than for bad deeds. Covering a wide swath of decades and a broad cross section of personalities and professions, the individuals portrayed range from courageous Ann Frank to generous Oprah Winfrey who gives millions to help the unfortunate.
The artist, who has been a "voice over actor", has added recordings that can be listened to while viewing the individuals portrayed. "Hi-tech" recorded essays written by the verbally and visually multitalented artist accompany some of the "wanteds". Talking about their contribution to society and accessible by a QR code or cell phone number - and for those who don’t have a cellphone (is there anyone today?)…a printed version will be made available - these essays that are a mini history lesson in human achievement.
To Visually re-create the sense of weathered wanted posters of the wild West that we remember from the distant past and using just four colors - raw umber, yellow ochre, Van Dyke Brown and Indian red - the artist initially made water-colors that were then enlarged to poster size and monoprinted, creating only one of each image. A few of these Wanted Posters were shown at Art Basel last year in Miami, but are showing in NYC for the first time. The concept for these artworks arose out of a previous series of works entitled "What is Missing?", twisting the concept of missing children chronicled on milk cartons to milk cartons that instead speak of the values missing in much of contemporary culture.
John Nieman's art continually connects the verbal and the visual, whether with recordings accompanying the art as in this exhibit or in paintings with images that have words superimposed. Hoping to make people see reality in a different light, both the ordinary and the unusual, many of his paintings incorporate words and images in equal powers. In fact, "a picture is worth a thousand words" describes some of his work perfectly, though superficially, since for him it is the idea that holds the greatest importance.
Nieman is continually fascinated by the nexus of art and pop culture, perhaps because before turning to fine art over a decade ago, he enjoyed a successful career in advertising. The artist has exhibited widely and collections of his paintings and poems have been published in "The Art of Lists" and "The Art of More Lists". "The Wanted Book" which contains images featured in the current show will be available. Nieman's art hangs in collections through out Europe and the US.
This will be John Nieman's first solo exhibit at Viridian. We look forward to sharing with you his heroines and heroes and invite you to think of some individuals that he might add to his series of Wanted.
Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday 12-6PM
For further information please contact Vernita Nemec, Gallery Director at 212 414 4040 or viridianartistsinc@gmail.com or view the gallery website: www.viridianartists.com