Odd Paintings
Since 2009 Bobby Dowler’s work has revolved around making artworks using found oil paint, old wood and second-hand canvas retrieved from the city or bought at London street markets. These new Odd Paintings are the product of the artist’s appraising, anatomising, manipulating and synthesising the materials into new objects.
The artist’s early works, at Lyndhurst Way and in his first solo show at the gallery, Many Worlds (2008), were unwieldy, tumbledown sculptures from scrap steel and detritus characterised by a sense of precarious existence, absurdity and contingency. Odd Paintings feature works that are part-assemblages, part-paintings, showcasing the artist’s inclination towards a creative indeterminacy. The artist describes the works as “unified objects that masquerade on the wall like paintings”.
Bobby Dowler (born in UK, 1983) lives and works in London. He first came to public attention for his renovation of a run-down squat at 78 Lyndhurst Way, Peckham, into a functioning art house hosting artists and exhibitions. He contributed a site-specific artwork composed of steel girder frameworks to the Bold Tendencies Sculpture Project (2009) and a massive outdoor work to the group exhibition Let there be Sculpture! at the New Art Centre, Roche Court (2010). More recently he has helped kick start an experimental poetry journal, Friary Road House, and has been organising readings and discussions from his home.
Over the Top
2011
Oil pastel, household paint and oil paint on canvas on pre-existing wood frame
50 x 50 cm
Special Oddject
2010
Pre existing wood frame and canvas with pre-existing image,oil pastel, oil paint, emulsion, varnish, found book paper, glue, chewing gum, garden leaves and soil
151.2 x 121 cm
Whitewash
2011
Oil paint, oil pastel, household paint, emulsion, chewing gum, found book paper, glue and varnish on canvas on pre-existing wood frame
148 x 122 cm
Arab Spring
2011 Oil pastel, oil paint, emulsion, half a paint brush and a Leonardo da Vinci melody on canvas on pre-existing wood frame
156.5 x 156.5 cm
Split!
2011 Oil pastel, oil paint, household paint, emulsion, chewing gum, found book paper, glue and varnish on canvas on pre-existing wood frame
124 x 75 cm
Circus
2011 Oil paint, oil pastel, household paint, emulsion, staples and varnish on canvas on pre-existing wood stretcher frame
95 x 71.8 cm
Weird Sky
2011
Pre-existing canvas with images, oil paint, oil pastel, household paint and staples on pre-existing wood frame
50 x 50 cm
Blood-Clot
2011
Pre-existing canvas with image, oil pastel, household paint, staples, half a wood stretcher frame
91 x 64 cm
