Graham Little
FLAG Art Foundation, New York
Through May 4, 2024
The FLAG Art Foundation presents an exhibition of works on paper by GRAHAM LITTLE, marking the Scottish artist’s debut institutional solo presentation in the United States. Created between 2000 and 2023, these sixteen gouache and colored-pencil works are meticulous portals into Graham Little’s complex and mysterious universe.
Graham Little begins each composition by scouring artist monographs and stacks of weathered spreads in fashion magazines from the 1970s and 1980s. With a reverence for reference, his scenes infuse late-twentieth century advertising aesthetics with lush art-historical motifs, such as in Untitled (Bedroom), 2021, in which decorative flourishes—reminiscent of the late British designer Terence Conran—furnish a mantle beneath a couple depicted in the stiffened style of Etruscan funerary art. Graham Little’s palette radiates warmth, and yet, his exacting handiwork and needlelike ornamentations are also coolly imperceptible, pristine, and smooth. In Graham Little’s world not a hair is out of place; each refined figure is a custodian of the quietly immaculate interiors and exteriors they inhabit.
Layering the aesthetics and ideals of Western advertising culture and art history, Graham Little’s out-of-time characters are positioned with an air of remove. Born out of commercial photography, the men and women inhabiting these uncanny scenes are meant to be looked at and are conscious of it—participants in their own objectification. In Untitled (Ballroom), 2013, a young woman in a backless midnight-blue gown, matching opera gloves, and architectural gold jewelry feigns surprise as if someone has just walked in the room; her attentive gaze causes the viewer to contemplate their own. In offering idealized portrayals of a privileged lifestyle, the artist hints at the fragility of yearning for luxury when none is for sale.
The intimate scale of Graham Little’s work further reinforces its conceptual foundations; as if peering through the window of a miniature model, viewers are encouraged to physically lean in and absorb the nuance of each detail. Despite their physicality, the ambiguous contexts of his subjects inspire endless curiosity: What is the man in the wine-colored robe and slippers reading while he sips his morning coffee? Who is the woman in an elaborate white and red-hearted apron—which matches her tablecloth and starched napkins—entertaining for tea? How did the mangy fox die? Graham Little’s compositions are keepers of their secrets, endlessly flexible to viewers’ imaginations.
A commissioned text by Hettie Judah, chief art critic at the British daily paper The i, accompanies Graham Little’s exhibition.
GRAHAM LITTLE (b. 1972, Dundee, Scotland) is an artist living and working in London, United Kingdom. Graham Little earned an BA in Fine Art from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design, Dundee, in 1995, an MA in Fine Art from Goldsmiths College, London, in 1997, and was a research associate at Goldsmiths College, London, in 1998. Recent solo exhibitions include dépendance, Brussels, Belgium (2023); Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan (2022); and Alison Jacques, London (2021); among others. Graham Little’s work has been included in numerous group exhibitions, including at the Hayward Gallery, London, UK (2021); V&A, Dundee, Scotland (2020); Manifesta 11, Zurich, Switzerland (2016); among others. Graham Little’s works are part of the permanent collections of institutions including the British Council Art Collection, UK; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY.
FLAG ART FOUNDATION
545 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10001
Graham Little @ FLAG, NYC - February 23 - May 4, 2024
