Time is Knots on a String
Mel Prest
May 21 - July 2, 2022
Contact Us for a full checklist of the exhibition
Galleri Urbane is pleased to present San Francisco artist Mel Prest in her third solo exhibition with the gallery. Through paintings on panel and works on paper, Time is Knots on a String expands on the geometric line-based work that has been the focus of the artist’s career for numerous years. In these newest works, Prest explores the feeling of deep, elongated time and optical shifting.
Watch: Video Tour
The exhibition’s title serves as a reflection of Prest’s interest in the human experience of time and refers to a method of keeping time used prior to clocks and calendars where events were delineated by knots on a string. This kind of physical action to denote ephemeral moments has evolved over millennia, reinforcing the notion of time as a construct. Through her paintings, Prest alludes to the flexibility of time by using fluorescent, metallic, micaceous or phosphorescent paint that flickers, glows or is shadowed in different light conditions. Viewing the paintings from different angles, distances, or times of day incites numerous experiences of the same object. An intricate network of freehand-painted lines criss-cross at various angles, provoking a moiré pattern that reads as optical illusion.
acrylic and mica on wood panel
60 x 60 x 2 in.
acrylic and mica on wood panel
60 x 60 x 2 in.
View Exhibition
WATCH:
Mel Prest checks in with Galleri Urbane from her San Francisco studio to answer questions about her upcoming exhibition.
acrylic and mica on wood panel
60 x 60 x 2 in.
acrylic and mica on wood panel
60 x 60 x 2 in.
Color also plays an imperative role in Prest’s practice. A range of sensorial effects are achieved through carefully chosen color palettes. Lines of blue hues in Cloud Flow (2021) emanate from the composition’s center, providing a rush of visual energy akin to a portal that one could enter. Darker hues in Summer Penumbra (2021) capture a more subtle intensity, emphasized by the work’s lone circular band anchoring the composition. Prest’s steadily controlled hand is showcased in a series of works on paper that shares its name with the exhibition. Delicate lines painted in watercolor provide insight to the artist’s process: a brushstroke's beginning and end are marked by concentrated points of pigment that create a rhythm around the paper. These works’ composition are divided into 12 sections, relating to the hours, months, astrological sings and cycles that mark the passage of time.
Acrylic on wood
36 x 36 x 2 in.
Acrylic on wood
36 x 36 x 2 in.
Fully appreciating Prest’s paintings requires dedicated focus. Colors reveal themselves and patterns emerge as one views them with a concentrated effort. With time, one can acknowledge the works’ full complexity.
Acrylic on wood
34 x 28 x 2 in.
Acrylic on wood
36 x 36 x 2 in.
Mel Prest is an American abstract artist whose intricate, layered paintings mobilize color, line, and perspective to activate kinetic perceptual phenomena. She lives and works in San Francisco, CA. Prest’s work has been exhibited internationally including: The Drawing Center, New York; The Weatherspoon Museum of Art, Durham, NC; IS Projects, Leiden, The Netherlands; McKenzie Fine Art, New York; Saturation Point, London, UK; Nakaochiai Gallery, Tokyo. Prest has been awarded residencies at: Ragdale, The Sam and Adele Golden Artist Foundation (2012 and 2018), Willapa Bay AiR, (2014 and 2021) The Wassaic Project, The MH deYoung Museum, Vermont Studio Center. Her work is held in collections at Apple; The Berkeley Art Museum, The Crocker Museum of Art; Kaiser Permanente; Marin General Hospital, The Mills College Art Museum, among others. She is preparing for her first solo museum show, at the Schneider Museum of Art in Ashland, Oregon, to open October 2022. As an independent curator, Prest has organized shows in Berkeley, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich and Zagreb. She served on the advisory board of The Art Monastery Project from 2007-2010 and is a founding member of Transmitter, a collaborative curatorial gallery initiative in Bushwick, Brooklyn, New York. Prest is currently an advisory board member of Root Division, a non-profit arts organization in San Francisco and artist advisory board member of Trestle Gallery in Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn. A longtime adjunct arts instructor, she is now a program developer for City College of San Francisco Extension.