Dan Coombs British, b. 1971
Daniel Coombs’ light infused pictorial spaces are simultaneously joyful and mysterious. Illuminated abstracted landscapes are populated by nude figures and the artist’s sensual and cerebral paintings may be considered a contemporary evocation of the long-standing tradition of depicting nudes in landscape ⎯ a subject favoured by artists such as Titian and Poussin, and most famously Paul Cézanne.
And yet, Coombs’ work expresses in part something not quite visible but deeply poignant, described as “The reality of human interaction that occurs at a level below language. I’m interested in the way people relate, penetrate and transform each other’s consciousness and I’m trying to show the figure as part of a total matrix of other figures.”
In terms of formal influence, the artist points to an affinity for the work of Georg Baselitz and Philip Guston, and a particular admiration for German modern artistic practice, noting these painters’ tendency to fuse figuration and abstraction. Further still, in Coombs’ energetically vivid compositions we see traces of harmonious use of hue, structure and figuration. This approach is reminiscent of the poetic conceptions of landscape and figuration found in Cézanne’s bather paintings particularly the use of lilting trees, elongated choreographed nudes now in Coombs’ pictures intersected by swathes of colour and areas of veiling and erasure, obliterating narrative and representation. The result is a series of powerful contemporary paintings that balance the sensual pleasure of paint, landscape and the canonical nude with a more cerebral study of intertextuality.
Rosa JH Berland
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BIOGRAPHY
Coombs holds his MA, Painting, Royal College of Art, London and BA, Ruskin School, Oxford University. The artist is the recipient of various awards and honours including the Mark Rothko Foundation Travel Award, 2004 and the Rome Scholar in Painting Award, British School in Rome, and the St. Peter's Church Commission, Brighton, 2000.
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Select solo exhibits include:
New Art Projects, London, 2014
Fine Art Society, 2011, London
Fred Gallery, London, 2009
Mihai Nicodim Gallery, Los Angeles, 2005
The Approach, London, 2003 and 2001
Rockwell, London, 2003
The Cornerhouse, Manchester , 2002
Habitat, London, 2000
Zwemmer Gallery, London, 2000
The Approach, London, 1999 and 1997
The artist has also participated in over 60 international group shows including:
Charlie Smith London, 2018, 2017 and 2015
Standpoint Gallery, London, 2018
Watson Farley and Williams LLP, London, 2018
Kingsgate Projects, London, 2017
Richmond Museum, 2016
Marylebone Crypt, 2016
APT, London, 2016
Galerie Dukan, Paris, 2015
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