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Nigel Mullins began the millennium as a nominee for the Daimler Chrysler Award for contemporary South African Art 2000, and later in the year he won a merit prize at the ABSA Atelier 2000. This second one-man exhibition at the Hanel Gallery, which includes his award-winning series of oil paintings, AnAesthetic for Cruelty and Violence, will be followed by one-man shows at the Royal Over-seas League premises in London and Edinburgh, as well as exhibitions in Germany. He will also participate in the "Art Fair 2001" in Frankfurt. The artist is known for his oil paintings which, while skillfully crafted, are invested with a manic energy. His large single-figure Superhumans (1999) have, through a set of anarchic mutations, become single heads, collectively titled Hopeful Monsters. These have retained the complex juxtaposition of abstract and literal elements of his previous work. The viewer is encouraged to share the same journey the artist has undertaken with each encounter with the canvas, and from one image to the next. AnAesthetic for Cruelty and Violence is a formally composed set of 42 paintings, rigorously created and colouristically sumptuous. Each smaller piece within the whole is the setting for an act or acts of violence, either blatant or inferred. From the jewel-like brilliance of early Western altarpieces to contemporary starkness, there is a rhythm and a beauty which cleverly and clearly sets up the paradox of aesthetic and violence.
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
24.5x30cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
35.5x46cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
30x40cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
81x90.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
24.5x30cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
24x30.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
24.5x30cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
30x40.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
40.5x50.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
35x45.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
62x71.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
62.5x71.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
35.5x45.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
65x84.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
40x50.5cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
35.5x45cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
65x80cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
44.5x55cm
"Hopefull Monster"
2001
oil on canvas
300x135x22cm
"Specimens"
2001
oil on canvas
165x155cmcm