Guy Shoham

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The Schmuklermanns, 2008, oil on canvas,
140 x 100 cm.

More images: www.artnews.org/guyshoham

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“To live is to leave traces” W. Benjamin

In his latest series of paintings, The Peeled Stickers, Guy Shoham transforms the canvas into a wood-laminate look-alike wardrobe doors or drawers with remnants of stickers, some of them peeled or faded. Now discarded to the storage room, once those pieces of furniture served as a ‘canvas’ for decorating a child’s or an adolescent’s room with stickers that defined the dreams, aspirations and identity of an individual. These fragmented remnants of youth emerge from the cobwebs of the viewer’s faded memory evoking buried feelings of hope, joy and frustration that are part of growing up.

This ‘damage’ to the furniture seems like a juvenile act of rebellion against the conventional aesthetic and established values. However, the desire to assert one’s individuality and rejection of the old often happens by following the current trends and fashions, so, perversely, is an act of conforming at the same time. By using mass-produced stickers it echoes the desire to belong and to fit in. It is a “ready-made identity”.

In their hyperrealism the paintings deceive us into believing that we are faced with real objects. Like birds that pecked on Zeuxis’ painting, fooled to believe that the depicted grapes were real, so we are fooled into believing that the stickers are real and resist a temptation to peel them or to pull the handles of the drawers.

“All art and literature are imitation” according to Aristotle. Guy’s art however is an imitation of the imitation. By imitating wood veneer, which itself is an imitation of the real thing, Guy taps into the kitsch aesthetic so prevalent amongst the middle classes. By imitating mass produced wood-laminate furniture and the stickers that represent popular culture at the time, Guy reverses the role of art by using it to imitate kitsch. Kitsch, a product of Western industrialization, cheap, mass produced, machine-made, “digests art for easy consumption”(Greenberg), so mass-produced stickers used on the laminate furniture can be viewed as a “digested individuality”.

Guy exposes how the ready-made aesthetic has infiltrated our culture, our tastes, fashions and aspirations and how by using it we fool ourselves into believing that we are individuals. But as “superior culture is one of the most artificial of all human creations”(Greenberg) then we, when facing it, exposed with all our imperfections , feel more real then ever.

Guy Shoham

1971 born in Tel-aviv, Israel

Lives and works in London, United Kingdom

Education

2003-2004 The Drawing Year, The Prince’s Drawing School, London.
2001-2002 MA fine art, Chelsea College of Art and Design, London.(Graduated with distinction)
1998-1999 The Jerusalem Studio School.
1998 Summer program at Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore.
1992-1996 BA fine art, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem.

Grants

Sep 03- June 04- Studies Grant, The Drawing Year, The prince’s trust, London.
Apr 03- Aug 04 - Artist in residence, Richmond Adult and Community College, London.
2002 - Studies Grant, AVI Fellowship, Switzerland

Solo Exhibitions

2012 Black Water, Artcore Gallery, Vienna.
2009 Evanesced, Shed And a Half Gallery, London, UK.
2008 Schmuklerman, Dollinger Art project, Tel-Aviv, Israel.
Curator:Liav Mizrahi
2005 Little China, The artists’ association, Tel-Aviv.
Curator: Orly Hoffman

Group Exhibitions

2013 Local Pulse,The artists' association, Tel-Aviv. Curator: Orly Hoffman
2012 Salon Conversation,The artists' association, TLV. Curator:O.Hoffman
2011 English Education, Dan Gallery, Tel-Aviv. Curator: Ravit Harari
2010 Crossing of the Fantasy, Tavi Art Gallery, TLV. Curator:K. Bar-Gil
2010 'Spotted'- Guy Shoham and Maria Walfram, The Water Institute, Givatyim, Israel. Curator: Orly Hoffman.
November 2007 'Quixotic Vision', Dollinger Art project, Tel-Aviv.
Curator: Matthew Roberts
July 2007, 'Salon 07' , seven sevem contemporary, London.
April 2007 'Cut and paste', Wing Project art space, Geneva. Curator: Lisa Bosse
2006 ‘Family Album, Micky Tiroche Fine Arts LTD, London. Curator: Gilly Karjevsky
2006 Forever after, Turf Gallery, London.
2006 A rich Seam, The Petach Tikva Museum, Petach Tikva, Israel. Curator Hagai Segev. (Catalog)
2006 Let there be light, Sotheby's-London,Curator: Marie Shek. (Catalog)
2005 Minimuseum, Paul Smith Window Shop, Floral St, London. Curator: Catherine Story
2005 Kriat beinaim, The artists’ association, Tel-Aviv.
Curator: Orly Hofman
2004 The Puppet Show,Time for Art Gallery, Tel-Aviv, Curator: Gideon Ofrat. (Catalog)
2003 The joy of Kitsch, Oriel Myrddin Gallery, Carmarthen. (Catalog)
2003 Picture Room, Gasworks Gallery, London, Curator: Goshka Macuga
2002 14” x 14”, Century Gallery, London (participant and co- curator)
2002 flowlock, Century Gallery, London (participant and co- curator)
2001 Chelsea case-2, The London Institute Gallery at Millbank, London
2001 A plastic bag, A.A.Silver, Tel-Aviv, Curator: Hadas Keidar
1999 Four at the Hamomhe, Hamomhe-alternative space, Tel-Aviv (Catalog)
1999 Paintings, the Artists’ house, Jerusalem
1999 Master Class, Noga gallery, Tel-Aviv
1998 Catamon-salon, Studio in the shelter, Jerusalem

Collections

HRH The Prince of Wales, UK.
Private collections in Israel, England, Germany, France and Switzerland.

Links

http://www.guyshoham.com/
http://www.kerenbargil.com
http://www.centurygallery.org.uk/archive/2002/200209_12_flowlock.htm
http://www.petachtikvamuseum.com/

Guy Shoham

Guy Shoham

00-44-7837068458
guyshoham@yahoo.com
www.guyshoham.com