Vine Pictures: Ronchini :: London

This vine grew on Naxos as though it were the first vine. I was on Naxos to do research for my ongoing project, A mind divided is no temple to Apollo. The vine thrust from the earth behind the house where we ate and slept. I was readIng Sonnets to Orpheus at the table behind the house. « Blatt meiner worte ». « Leaf of my word ». I began drawing the vine; writing it, as light shifted above and below. I say below, because I was sat with this vine on the edge of a cliff, and, from our perch, sky and sea moved together as the hours passed. 

 

 

Ronchini is proud to present our third solo exhibition with American artist Richard Höglund. This exhibition sees the first appearance of his new Vine Pictures in the UK, evoking deep relations between thought, language and interpretation.  

Inspired by a vine on Naxos, the works in the exhibition explore the sensual content of the idea of the vine. Continuing themes explored in Höglund’s earlier series, these works stem from a profound philosophical approach to drawing. The artist allows the thought that the vine evokes in him unfold by drawing, writing, trying to make space for it to mature unconstrained by the limits of figuration and interpretation. 

“Leaf of my word”. I began drawing the vine; writing it, as light shifted above and below.

Vine Pictures demonstrate the coming together of two strata of time – the past seen in the figurative representations of the vine in ancient Greek culture, and Höglund’s present fascination with the strength of the physical vine growing behind the house where he was staying on Naxos. The paintings Höglund developed express the universality of the idea of continual unfolding of life. There is simplicity in the unfurling of meaning with the passing of time. The vine has a beginning, a root in the Earth; it exists in a continuous process of adaptation and movement. The vine has a directionality about it, it is a vector reaching out and up towards the sky; though its end is often concealed, covered by layers of previous growth – just like the end of a thought that cannot be seen in its progression, hidden behind other thoughts that arise with time.

I sat with the vine on the edge of a cliff, and, from our perch, sky and sea moved together as the hours passed. “Wave whose sea I gradually become”.