GILLIAN CARNEGIE

Gladstone is delighted to present a new exhibition of works by Gillian Carnegie.

March 12 – April 26, 2025

Though the artworld in recent years has privileged explicit narrative over formal nuance, Gillian Carnegie has long insisted that her subject matter remains secondary to the act of painting itself. The artists recurring motifs—cats, staircases, dried flowers, portraits, and trees—serve merely as the foundations for her process. Liberated from narrative convention, Carnegie’s approach allows the viewer to focus solely on the paintings themselves, inviting us to experience her imagery as a series of ephemeral moments that document pure visual perception.

Carnegie’s work doesn’t demand excessive analysis yet paradoxically offers a wealth of analytical possibilities. The artist’s quiet demeanor and avoidance of the artworld’s spotlight manifests in works that are introspectively evocative of stillness. Carnegie once remarked, “I never felt the need to feel informed about the experience of seeing a painting in order to understand it… I’d like to think someone would still want to look at a painting rather than inform themselves about it beforehand.”

Carnegie makes just two to three paintings a year, and though she consistently revisits a handful of motifs, she is also known for presenting strikingly novel interpretations of her subjects within these confines. The artist utilizes a similarly enigmatic approach to titling, often reusing names across different subject matters so that her works are distinguishable only by the year of their creation. Deeply emotional and unwavering in their focus on form, these paintings communicate powerfully through their silence.

Carnegie’s portraits typically depict herself or those within her inner circle. These subjects are captured in contemplative poses and against minimalist backdrops, exuding an air of self-possessed elegance. Though painted in color, the portraits are executed with a subdued palette, echoing the restrained beauty found in her other works. Intriguingly, these figurative pieces share a kinship with Carnegie’s enigmatic cat paintings, and the emotional states of the sitters remain as inscrutable as those of the cats.