"Non-linear storytelling"

Surprising and striking exhibition at Blain Southern (till 19 January) of large, detailed, imaginative, skillful drawings by Berlin-based artist Jonas Burgert -

 Some details -

From the press release:

schlagen und bleiben is the first exhibition to focus solely on Jonas Burgert’s drawings as an independent body of work. While the artist is best known for intensely coloured, large-scale paintings, this intimate exhibition focuses solely on intricate drawings on paper, each subtly rendered in pencil. 

Densely populated tableaux are how Burgert explores non-linear storytelling. Often created at the same time as these expansive pictorial dramas, the subjects of his individual portraits are exiles from the main story, isolated within their own frame. This exhibition explores Burgert’s portraits as entities in their own right. Untethered from a central narrative, they become newly enigmatic, each alluding to its own particular mysteries. 

Burgert is interested in the personification of psychology through figurative painting and it is his ongoing close observation of human emotion that gives his characters such a potent charge