Eccentric Riders

Still lifes, combinations of shapes and colors, totems of life. The works gathered here share the capacity to be, through channels specific to each personality, the bearers of a personal narrative, of intuitions, of sensibilities. 

Brought together by cadet capela, the artists Nickola Pottinger, Humberto Poblete-Bustamante and Rhys Lee do not dialogue through their personal experiences, their plastic sensitivities - but through the way their creative process can be read.  
Faced with the paintings of Humberto Poblete-Bustamante, the eye is tempted to go beyond the abstract essence of his painting, to detect the feeling expressed by the colors and shapes, the meaning of his assemblages. Confronted with Nickola Pottinger’s totem-like reliefs, one wishes to question the meaning - the underlying cultural influences - of these constructions, of the material and materials used. Rhys Lee’s still lifes also invoke this idea of association. Here, it is a question of influences, references, and positioning in terms of artistic trends. 

These three “Eccentric Riders” have in common a singular relationship to painting, and have the gift of drawing from the diversity of possibilities it offers. The material allows to carry a word, to build a thought, but also to give body to a story of which the author was not fully aware until then. A work must provoke a reaction, and here, there is matter to dig. The works brought together lead the public to stop, to look for answers, explanations, references, a meaning or a reason for its absence. As the minutes pass, we read things, some of which go beyond what the artist expresses through his creative process. The public appropriates the reading of these works. A personal message for a personal reading.

Rhys Lee
Born in 1975 in Brisbane, based in Melbourne. His work, articulated between portraits and still lifes, is born of a tangle of styles, of back and forth between influences and genres from graffiti to cubism. If it is tempting to decipher codes and references, the artist’s approach allows choices guided by his subconscious to emerge, so there is no need to ask him, rather take the time to read his still lifes.

Nickola Pottinger
Born in 1986 in Jamaica, based in New York. The artist, who is also a curator, could lead us to believe that she organizes the plasticity of her works as she would with those of artists to whom she is sensitive, guided by her intuitions. Nickola Pottinger gives life to materials, converts her feelings into an artistic technique. The artist, who participates in this year’s New Museum Triennial, accumulates moments, social and societal sensibilities in her reliefs.

Humberto Poblete-Bustamante
Born in 1966 in Santiago, Chile, now living in Paris. His paintings are marked by an exchange between man and matter. Over time, the painting gives body to the spirit of the artist, to his impulses, he transcribes the energy of an imaginary, rather than representing it.

Henri Robert