Schnabel in Hong Kong: JULIAN SCHNABEL

Warwick House West, Taikoo Place, Hong Kong, 7 – 24 November 2007.

Katie de Tilly owner of the 10 Chancery Lane Gallery, a gallery at the forefront of contemporary art in Hong Kong, has teamed up with international entrepreneur David Tang and Fortune Cookie Projects to bring Julian Schnabel and his work to Hong Kong in November 2007.

This will be Schnabel’s first exhibition in Hong Kong and his first visit to the region. To have an artist of his calibre and works of such importance and scale here is a rare event indeed. Since finding prominence in the 1980’s by bringing painting back to a heroic scale, Schnabel continues to be a great influence in the contemporary art world. Known for his vivid, striking paintings and drawings, his use of non traditional canvases and in particular his iconic ‘plate paintings’ that incorporate broken china, he is without doubt one of the world’s most influential and important living artists.

First and foremost Julian Schnabel is an artist of great standing, his achievements include being the youngest artist ever to have a retrospective at the Tate Gallery and his works have been shown and are collected by museums and galleries throughout the world. Demonstrating his exceptional versatility he also recently won the 2007 Cannes Film Festival best director award for the ‘The Diving Bell and the Butterfly’. His other directorial credits include ‘Basquiat’ and ‘Before Night Falls’. His work on the interior of the Gramercy Park Hotel in New York showcases his talents in yet another field and gives visual art lovers another chance to savour his genius.

Currently Julian Schnabel is riding the crest of a wave, this summer alone, he has had major exhibitions at the Palazzo Venezia in Rome, Italy, the Tabacalera, San Sebastian, Spain and the inaugural exhibition at the Andy Hall Foundation at Schloss Derneburg, Germany. It is on show at present at the Beijing World Art Museum in China.

The 40 works in the exhibition span his career from the 1980’s to today. Highlights include the examples of the ‘plate paintings’ for which he is so famous. As befits such a significant exhibition, it will also be seen in Seoul, at the Hyundai Gallery, and the Shanghai Zendai Museum of Modern Art.

There will be a major book published for the exhibition. David Moos, curator of the Art Gallery of Ontario and Bruce Ferguson of the AGO will contribute texts.