Cannon Dill, Desert Lily/Spiral pot, 2023. Acrylic on canvas, 152.4 x 121.9cm. Courtesy: the artist and PIERMARQ*, Sydney.

PIERMARQ* presents Heat of the Valley, an exhibition of new work by Los Angeles based artist Cannon Dill. This is the artist’s second solo exhibition at PIERMARQ* in Sydney.

Dill’s bold, stylized depictions of figures and objects combine colorful abstraction with sharp elements of design. A blend of the familiar and bizarre, Dill invites viewers “to traverse the paintings as one would meander through the warm blue evening air.” Signature elements of Dill’s compositions, such as birds, bulls, horses and fish return the gaze of the viewer refracting the direction of observation. Vases and perfume bottles make reference to the process of distillation, echoing Dill’s style of extracting only the essential and important details of his subjects.

In Heat of the Valley, Dill evokes the haze of summer through 13 works of ochre and orange acrylic on canvas, depicting landscapes with wild plants and animals, completed in the midst of the heatwave of the Californian summer. In Fire Flower, vivid, stylized flames form the jagged leaves of the Joshua Tree, like firecrackers evoking a blazing hot desert evening under starry skies. Still lifes such as Sunflowers, recall Matisse’s cut outs in their emphasis of color and line, with Dill’s unique and playful textured marks made using a sliced jalapeno pepper as a stamp for applying acrylic paint in the flower’s center. Dill writes, “Through a feverish fog ashes become stars and pigment bleeds into the foreground, compressing the space between imagination and reality.”

Dill has exhibited in Los Angeles, Oakland and NY. Dill’s work has been exhibited in public collections including the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Opening Event: Thursday 14 September, 6 – 8pm.

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