Donovan Rose: Descendants of Leisure
The 5th exhibition at The Ou Gallery, “Descendants of Leisure,” showcased the paintings of Ou co-founder Donovan Rose.
Over the past 12 months DR has been developing this series of large scale paintings in both oil and acrylic, exploring the theme of “bathers” which leans on the study of form and figure while borrowing heavily from abstraction.
Taking from photographs of his father’s family at their home on the Shuswap Lake in the late 1960’s as well as current in studio studies, this series plays with freedom and the constriction of time, form and colour; mixing the habits and experiences of the leisure of his father’s youth with his own imagined scenes of desired languor. The theme of these works also pulls inspiration from the “bathers” of Cezanne, Picasso and Henri Matisse, and pays homage to any artist who understands that art is not always an expression, and is often, simply, a problem worth trying to solve while drinking a bit of vodka.
