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KNOEDLER & COMPANY TO SHOW ‘JOHN WALKER: COLLAGE’ w/no cuts

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NEW YORK CITY — Knoedler & Company will present a survey focused on John Walker’s work in collage, spanning the years 1974–78, and returning to his most recent explorations in that medium dating 2003–04, on February 3.

When Walker created his earliest collages he was in his mid-30s and teaching at various New York Schools. In these early collages, Walker departed from Cubist convention by working in massive scale vertical formats. With large pieces of canvas as collage material, these works are characterized by powerful jutting, layered, angular forms, as in “Juggernaut with Plume for P. Neruda,” 1975.

The “Ostraca” and “Numinous” series followed in 1977–78 — the “Numinous” collages linking Walker to a tradition of painters that includes Manet, Goya and Matisse.

Since 2000, a central motif in Walker’s work has been the muddy beaches and tide pools near his Maine home. He observes this subject intimately through its many permutations. His most recent collages fall within this series — freely painted, they are composed of heavy torn paper layered upon paper, overwritten with text inspired by local Maine roadside signs.

“John Walker: Collage” is on view until March 19. The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalog with essay by Dore Ashton, In the Light of Painting: John Walker’s Recent and Not So Recent Work.

Knoedler & Company is at 19 East Street. For information, 212-794-0550 or www.knoedlergallery.com.