VIEWING ROOM

TOM KEUKENMEESTER
'THERE WERE MANY EDENS’

Jerico Contemporary is delighted to present our first solo exhibition with Australian artist Tom Keukenmeester, There Were Many Edens from Thursday 13th of May to Saturday 5th June 2021. Presented in partnership with Art Incubator, we are pleased to share our inaugural exhibition with the initiative.

Referencing art history and narratives both personal and imagined, There Were Many Edens explores a utopian environment liberated from the boundaries of time and place. Originally conceived around the biblical Garden of Eden and the notion of a beginning of time, Keukenmeester began to explore the many ancient religions that believed in paradise gardens of abundance and sanctuary. Informed by his readings and research, Keukenmeester came to instill his own imagination and imagery into these narratives. Bringing together the mediums of European portrait style oil painting and hand-built ceramic sculpture, the interplay between two and three dimensional forms sees Keukenmeester offer a unique perspective. The exhibition sees the artist create his own dreamlike world free from modern constructs and complexities, existing before civilisation, or perhaps, in a postlapsarian space where contemporary comforts have been stripped.

Comprising six paintings and seven ceramics, the works in There Were Many Edens occupy a place that exists somewhere between past, present and future; merging the ancient and the contemporary. Hybrids of human and animal forms, the figures are drawn from things both real and imagined, reflecting the artist’s interest in evolution and its unknown possibilities.

Some of the pieces are closely inspired by art historical references, like the paintings of Spanish artist Francisco Goya, who was known for his satirical comments on superstitious beliefs and illuminating the realities of war. Keukenmeester draws from Goya’s painting ‘Witches' Sabbath’, 1798, which depicts the devil manifested as a large male goat encircled by a group of witches in a moonlit barren landscape. “I wanted to create a duality of something a little scary looking but also beautifully adorned...,” explains Keukenmeester of his works ‘Goat After Goya’, 2021 and ‘Seated Goat Figure’, 2021, which reinterpret fragments of the monstrous, abject themes of ‘Witches’ Sabbath’ in vivid colour — where flowers have appeared in the absence of evil. ‘Boys Climbing a Tree’, 1791 - 1792 is another of Goya’s works that informed Keukenmeester’s ‘Beating Out The Clouds’, 2021 where instead of three bandaged and sickly boys playing together, three adventurous creatures climb to the top of a mountain high above the clouds. 

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY:

Tom Keukenmeester was born in Adelaide, Australia. His selected exhibitions include 'Memento' (Group), Saint Cloche, Sydney (2019), Loreto Spring Art Fair, Adelaide (2019), 'Adelaide 2069' (Solo), Adelaide (2018-2019), Youth Opportunities Fundraiser, TransformARTive Group Exhibition, Plant-4Bowden, South Australian (2018), 'The Rocks', The Historical Rocks Precinct, Sydney (2017), Loreto Spring Art, Star Portrait Artist, Adelaide 2016). Recently Tom's work has been selected as a recipient of the Art Incubator Grant 2021, finalist in the 2020 Fisher’s Ghost Art Prize, 2019, Kilgour Art Prize, 2019 & 2017 Royal South Australian Society of Arts Biennial Portrait Prize (Winning the 2017 RSASA award), 2017 Cliftons Art Prize, 2016 Fleurieu Art Prize, 2016 Loreto Star Portrait, 2015 Lethbridge Art Prize, the 2014 Cossack Art Prize and the 2014 Royal South Australian Society of Arts Youth Art Prize. The artist currently lives and works in Melbourne, Australia.