After 3 years since his first exhibition in Venice, the English painter Anthony Corner returns to the city with a new substantial body of work for the exhibition Lamentation, Flux and an Empty Bladder, from February 22nd to September 11th, 2020 at the exhibition space SPARC*- Spazio Arte Contemporanea.

The title of the exhibition certainly anticipates to the visitor a certain emotional context and a specific way through which Corner makes the experience of life and being a painter.

The choice to present this recent and large group of new works in Venice is certainly not coincidental. In his paintings as well as in the lagoon, you can quickly go from darkness to light, from sordid to beauty, in perpetual comings and goings from one extreme to another. In the mud that emerges from the canals, rather than in the thick fog that prevents you from orienting or in the experience of walking along the dark and narrow alleys, Corner has recognized sensations, smells and atmospheres already experienced. He felt an immediate affinity with the city.

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Venice, however, illuminated by the opalescent light of the morning or sunset, seen through its reflections on the calm and flat surface of the lagoon, silent at certain magical moments of the day, opens to unpredictable glimpses of beauty and the breath of those who live this is quiet and in harmony with everything around them.

Thus, those who know the work of this artist are aware that suffering, anguish and torment have long been the drivers of his search for meaning. In this exhibition, however, in the dense layering of the gloomy color that obscures everything, under a thick blanket, they found wide gaps of light: entire portions of canvas left empty and white. From the linguistic clangour of previous paintings, where color, words, graphics and materials condense contaminating each other, in a harrowing lament that emerges from the canvas, in this series of latest works you will encounter a silent space and painting becomes a pain relief and a break from the daily battle.

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Over 100 works on display, including large paintings and small works, will create a real pictorial environment in the exhibition space, in which the space itself becomes contained together with the work, offering the visitor an immersive and close-up experience with artist's interiority.

The exhibition will also include the book “Lamentation, Flux and an Empty Bladder”, published by Number Nine Press.

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Anthony Corner is a graduate of the Royal College of Art. He was Artist-in-Residence at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and has designed for opera. His work has been exhibited extensively, including in Venice and at the Royal Academy, London, and has been acquired by numerous private collections. He lives and works in London and Oxfordshire.

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