Thomas Broadbent, “The Pear Tree” 36”x48” oil on canvas
The Front Room Presents:
THOMAS BROADBENT
Nesting
September 23rd- October 15th, 2023
Sat-Sun 12-5 & by appointment
Opening Reception, September 23rd, 5-7PM
205 Warren Street, Hudson, NY
718-782-2556
Front Room Gallery is pleased to present “Nesting,” a solo exhibition of watercolor and oil paintings by artist Thomas Broadbent on view at our new location at 205 Warren Street in Hudson, NY. Broadbent’s philosophical compositions often depict animals amongst mundane trappings of everyday humanity. These paintings, in a seemingly well structured world of man-made artifice, reference the underlying impulses of nature.
After a few years of Covid lockdown these paintings bring to mind a world without humans, in which the animals have taken ownership of the things that we value—and possibly our charactoristics as well. These situations could be looked at as stand-ins for society in an ambiguous relationship with nature that is absurd—and yet peculiarly comfortable. In these contemporary surrealist paintings, Broadbent positions animals amongst high design elements, dislocating them from their native habitats
In the oil painting “The Pear Tree,” a lush pear tree has grown through a striped Louis XVI armchair with ripe fruits on its branches and a nest of roots emerging from under the seat of the chair. Perched on the armchair is a large raven, who gazes side-eyed and apprehensively at the viewer, a sliver of pear dangling from it’s beak.
Thomas Broadbent, “Leopard on Rietveld Chair” 40”x29.5” watercolor on paper
Thomas Broadbent, “The Excursion” oil on canvas, 36”x48”
Broadbent’s paintings examine the role and existential value that luxury design items have on society. Referencing the materialism and symbolism in Dutch Golden Age Still Lifes, the artist updates the symbols of wealth and necessity, as considered from a contemporary vantage point. Isolated elements are selected by the artist to extract meaning from the rich history of furniture and interior design trends. In a scenario that gives a nod to Modernism, a regal leopard sits watchfully on a modernist Gerrit Rietveld Red Blue Chair as if seated a neoplastic throne. Broadbent’s paintings are plausible scenarios, but the unlikely combination of elements, objects, and animals are otherworldly and ubiquitous at the same time, each component carefully selected to heighten its’ meaning.
Broadbent’s watercolor painting, “Minerva” is rendered sensitively with a naturalist’s eye for detail. A snowy owl alights on a towering stack of books with a pencil in its beak. Gazing at the viewer, a reflection of the forest can be seen in its eyes. This emotive painting convey’s the animal’s wistfulness to return the forest as it stands amongst products created from trees. Minerva is the Roman goddess of wisdom, justice, law, victory, and the sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. She is often depicted with her sacred creature, an owl usually named as the "owl of Minerva”, which symbolised her association with wisdom and knowledge. These mythological references heighten the poignancy of this painting with a further reference to knowledge in reading and writing in the composed elements of books and a pencil.
Broadbent has shown extensively throughout the U.S. as well as internationally. Broadbent’s work won the Pulse Prize for best solo booth at Pulse Art Fair. His work was subsequently featured in “Mission to Space” at the Children’s Art Museum in Manhattan. His work is in the permanent collection of the National Museum of Wildlife Art. Broadbent’s numerous solo exhibitions include the Visual Art’s Center of New Jersey, Croxhapox Gallery (Gent, Belgium) Voorkamer Gallery (Lier, Belgium) Inspace gallery (Beijing, China) and the Newark Arts Council. Broadbent’s work has been reviewed in The New York Times, The New Jersey Star-Ledger, NY Arts, The Brooklyn Rail and numerous other publications.
inquiries please contact Kathleen Vance, k@frontroom.org
Thomas Broadbent, “Minerva” watercolor on paper, 30”x22”