Nino Mier Gallery is pleased to present New Horizons, an exhibition of paintings by Kasper Sonne. Seven new oil paintings exploring the compositional motif of the horizon line will mark Sonne’s Los Angeles debut. The artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery, New Horizons will be on view in Glassell Park from February 10 – March 11, 2023, with an opening reception on February 10 from 5-8pm.
New Horizons comprises paintings that tap into the horizon line as a limiting form. So often used to symbolize boundlessness, for Sonne the horizon is a space of rupture where the sky meets its limit at the sea, a field, or some more recent structure. Within his vibrantly colored paintings, anonymous figures stand amid natural and built environments, displaced from both their own world and from that of the viewer.
New Horizons is the latest installment in a more recent return to figuration for the artist. With roots in design and graffiti, Sonne spent years focusing on abstraction as a way to fully explore the qualities of medium without being beholden to narrative. The new works manifest an intersection of both interests, as Sonne continues to focus on painterly qualities of color, line, and form, while re-introducing figural elements.
In Sonne’s paintings, solitary figures are beholden to the structural geometries that surround them. Sonne frequently uses architecture to create a shallow compositional field, creating a sense of theatricality within his works. The Wall (2022) depicts the profile of a blue-skinned, blue-robed man walking before a brick wall. The wall’s function as a barrier is not clear: a portal reveals only a vast field beyond, recalling the metaphysical art of early 20th century Italy. Here, a construction which orders urban space portentously interrupts an otherwise bucolic scene.
Sonne’s figures are sometimes depicted from a great distance, imbuing compositions with a sense of melancholia or isolation. In Sunset (2023), for instance, a horizon line sharply delineates the burnt orange and pink sky from the calm, purple sea below. In the center of the painting, a setting sun illuminates a figure, far from any land mass, floating in the water below. Resembling the bisected composition of Rothko’s color field paintings, Sunset also shares their strong affective charges—here, Sonne sinks into the fine line between disquietude and serenity.
“The source material [of my compositions],” Sonne explains, “is a combination of found images, personal images, and parts I just imagine. I then combine various fragments to create an image. I never paint directly from a photograph, as I’m not interested in depicting reality – I’m interested in visualizing a mood.”
Kasper Sonne (b. 1974, Copenhagen; lives and works in New York) holds a BA at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Architecture, Design and Conservation. Recent exhibitions include Quartz Studio, Turin, IT; A Hug From The Art World, New York, US; Kaikai Kiki Gallery, Tokyo, JP. Collections include HEART-- Herning Museum of Contemporary Art, Herning, DK; David Roberts Arts Foundation, London, UK; Fubon Art Foundation, Taiwan.