Interpretations of Venice
Known for his evocative blend of figuration and elemental abstraction, British painter Nigel Cooke brings a series of nocturnal Venetian landscapes to Tokyo for his first solo exhibition in Japan. You’ll see small-scale, highly atmospheric works created during Cooke’s recent residency at the historic Fondazione Querini Stampalia in Venice, where he immersed himself in the floating city’s unique composition of light, stone and water.
Rather than capturing classic Venetian vistas, the paintings present stage-like spaces filled with repeating shapes, stone platforms and organic forms that seem to dissolve into — or emerge from — the dark lagoon. Drawing inspiration from Renaissance painters — Tintoretto’s fluid brushwork and Giovanni Bellini’s theatricality — Cooke treats each canvas like a window into his process, layering figures, animals and abstract linework. Accompanying the Venice series is a collection of rich, opaque watercolors created in Formentera, Spain. The paints used here incorporate actual seawater, tying Cooke’s abstractions to their Mediterranean environment in a literal sense.
