Toby Raine: this week’s featured Sydney Contemporary artist.

We’re excitedly anticipating this year’s Sydney Contemporary. At the James Makin Gallery booth this year will be Annalisa Ferraris, Patrick Dagg, Sally Walk, Elizabeth Barnett, Toby Raine (featured) and Jasper Knight. In the coming weeks we’ll be featuring each of these artists, giving you a taste of what’s ahead. ⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠This week’s featured Sydney Contemporary artist is Toby Raine. In his distinctive and gestural style Raine revisits iconic images. As a voyeur, rather than an advocate, he reflects on visual and systemic problems. Drawing from popular imagery that is part of the ‘new normal’ daily deluge of visual media and virtual provocations, Raine uses these images as a starting point to dissect the problem of painting. ⁠⁠

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⁠⁠Much like the expressionists, Raine employs automatism to deconstruct the image. With performative actions, swiping and scraping, he goads his oil paint to exude and accumulate over surfaces. Without commitment to the outcome or the subject, Raine attempts to examine the problem of painting, of thinking, of meaning, of being. Simultaneously he is rejecting and intensifying the images that provide the impetus to paint. The problem is not resolved but it has been addressed. ⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠Sydney Contemporary runs from 9-12 September.⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠Artist portrait: Lyle Adams

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