Exhibitions
TED FAIERS: THE DRAWING ROOM
David Lusk Gallery Memphis / 97 Tillman St. October 10, 2023 - November 18, 2023
Ted Faiers
David Lusk Gallery Memphis is pleased to present THE DRAWING ROOM, a selection of black and white paintings on paper by Ted Faiers.
An acclaimed modernist, Faiers created thousands of paintings, drawings, and woodcuts throughout his artistic career spent in Canada, New York, and Memphis. Distinctive periods mark his career’s passage through time, maintaining a clear trajectory with harmonious color, musical rhythm, and abstract form. In this set of drawings from the late 1950s and early 60s minimal and fluid black shapes on stark white paper became Faiers’ jumping off point for his stylized figures and scenes.
Referencing shapes from his Indian Space Paintings from the 1940s and 50s and experimenting with new brushstrokes, Faiers builds upon his practice to expand his abstract sensibilities and defined, flattened forms into pictorial and narrative works. Titles like “Pinched” and “Forces” add tactile elements to otherwise ambiguous works while others are prototypes for his forthcoming woodcuts of twisters and sunrises and dancing women and stoic profiles. Maintaining his love of working with paper, Faiers pays close attention to the thin paper’s reaction to a wet brush. Thin dry paint scuffs the surface and thick viscous pigment congeals to wrinkle it. These crinkles and ridges become sculptural elements in these compositions.
Born in England in 1908 and raised in Western Canada, Ted Faiers studied at the Banff School of Fine Arts and the Department of Extension, University of Alberta in Canada and at the Art Students League in New York. He taught at Memphis College of Art for 30 years while leading a prolific studio practice. He completed public commissions for Memphis in May and First Tennessee Bank and had a strong exhibition history throughout his life. His work is in the collections of Alberta Art Foundation, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock; AT&T Collection, Chicago; Baker Donelson, Memphis; Butler Snow Law Firm, Jackson, MS and Memphis; First Tennessee Bank, Memphis; Hyde Foundation, Memphis; Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis; Methodist Hospital, Memphis; nexAir, Memphis; Suntrust Bank, Memphis; Canadian National Railway, Montreal; and Tennessee State Museum, Nashville, among others..
David Lusk Gallery is located at 97 Tillman St in Memphis, TN. Gallery hours are Tu - Sa 10a - 5p. For more information or images, please contact Judith Jessup at judith@davidluskgallery.com or 615-780-9990
Image: Untitled D755, ink on paperl, 11x14, c. 1955
