PEDRO BARBEITO AND JASON GRINGLER

June 18-August 30, 2009

Pedro Barbeito and Jason Gringler will be featured in an exhibition of new works at the Charest-Weinberg Gallery, opening June 18 through August 8, 2009. The opening reception will be held on June 18 from 6pm – 9pm at 250 NW 23rd St. Space 408, Miami, FL 33127.

Pedro Barbeito’s work investigates the impact of the Internet and digital image making on the history and language of painting.  How these mediums communicate cultural knowledge is of particular interest to Barbeito. The digital aesthetic of his paintings reflect both the internet source of the images  as well as the graphics programs used to edit and simplify the images.  The paintings are built up of thin layers of paint, which range from 1 layer, which is flat and provides the illusion of three-dimensional space, to up to 20 layers, where the physicality of the paint creates actual form and space. Often, the original found imagery used at the painting’s inception is completely lost to this layering and deconstruction of the image. Through scrutinizing the relationship between process, surface, image and meaning, Barbeito is able to use process to define the work’s narrative.

His new series of work, “Siren,” refers to the siren as an alarm and to the alluring women from Greek mythology. This duality is reflected in the paintings’ play with figurative representation and spacial abstraction where the oval structures represent both a figure and a window into an abstract world that explodes outward from a central point.  The resulting images are combinations of contemporary female sirens and of spaces of the artist’s own invention, which refer to the 3-D animated spaces of the digital world.

Further developing Pedro’s themes of layering and reflection, Jason Gringler’s paintings act much like the pages of a sketchbook, physically building ideas reiterating the importance of construction. His work focuses on moments of flux, between looking and registry, between the recognition of an object’s existence and the recognition of associations that object holds.

Gringler’s fragmentary imagery and process; a focus on building a painting through its parts, is inspired by the industrial environment. The architectural structures within his multimedia collages reflect this practice, down to the paintings’ layered construction and materials:  acrylic, mirrors, Plexiglas, spray paint and tape.

Exhibited internationally, both Pedro Barbeito and Jason Gringler live and work in New York. This is also the first exhibition for both artists with the Charest-Weinberg Gallery, whose reputation continues to grow as Miami’s premiere venue for emerging contemporary art.

June 18th, 2009 - August 30th, 2009