The English Artist Gerry Judah is exhibiting six large scaled monochromatic paintings/reliefs in his first New York show. This is the London-based artist’s first exhibition in the United States and will be on view until January 29 2011. The paintings are based on aerial photography, inspired by conflict – particularly in the Middle East, whether it be in Iraq, Afghanistan or Gaza. Judah’s work also reflects global concerns for the environment, and the decimation that follows natural disasters, such as the flooding of New Orleans in 2005, and the recent Australian bushfires. Judah’s work is a direct response to landscapes of destruction and explores war, conflict, peace, natural disasters and devastation. Urban landscapes, constructed from buildings, complete with internal structures, communication wires and water towers are fixed onto canvas, and then systematically destroyed resulting in frozen vignettes of silence and loss.
The rubble and debris are fused onto a background of empty canvas with layers of acrylic gesso to create monochrome and quasi-abstract compositions. The white on white, black on black and red on red constructions are epic in scale and story. Gerry Judah was born in Calcutta, India in 1952, and studied art at Barnet College of Art. In 1970, he obtained a First-Class Honors degree in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and studied sculpture as a postgraduate at the Slade School of Fine Art, University College London. Amongst a number of commissions from public museums and institutions, Gerry Judah was asked by the Imperial War Museum in London in 2000 to create a large installation of the selection ramp in Auschwitz Birkenau for the Holocaust Exhibition opened by the Queen. Extensive research and numerous visits to Auschwitz led Judah to produce a highly acclaimed work that encouraged him to take his art in yet a new direction, creating a body of work consisting of three-dimensional paintings exploring the devastations of war and the ravages man has made upon the environment caused by recent conflicts in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. December 10, 2010 – January 29, 2011 Fitzroy Gallery | 77 Mercer Street New York, NY 10012