※ US original poster

Year: 2024

Artwork size: 30 × 24 inches (76.2 × 61 cm)

Project Description

Created in 2024, this poster featuring * * Robot and Bear (2024) is designed to accompany an exhibition by artist Jonas Wood * * at Grosvenor Hill * * Gagosian * * in London.

In these new works, Wood explores the expression of colors, patterns, and spaces by interpreting recurring themes such as plants, family, and upholstery. These works are characterized by the visual collision of contrasting graphic segments and the subtle reversal of contrast and perspective.

Robot and Bear depicts the artist's beloved dogs (past and present) as they are transported from the pages of an interior design magazine to an apartment overlooking the landscape of Los Angeles.

Poster / Glossy Paper

Jonas Wood was born in Boston in 1977. He initially studied psychology at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York, before pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in painting at the University of Washington in Seattle. Wood is known for depicting everyday environments, and his interiors and landscapes are highly regarded. He employs a wide range of formal techniques to create visual perspectives that differ from viewers’ usual perceptions. Inspired by the fragmented compositions of Cubism and the expressive, nonrealistic interiors of Vincent van Gogh, Henri Matisse, and David Hockney, Wood begins by constructing compositions from photographs, then layers different viewpoints onto the canvas to create a cohesive image. The finished work blurs the boundary between representational space and abstraction. Now based in Los Angeles, Wood continues to develop his personal painting style, creating oil-painting masterpieces that appear both flat and three-dimensional. Critics see this effect as the result of Wood’s combination of realistic figurative imagery with broad areas of unmixed color.

Wood held a solo exhibition at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles in 2010, and his works have also appeared in numerous group exhibitions across the United States. Wood’s paintings echo the long art-historical tradition of depicting scenes of everyday life and can be considered a major achievement in contemporary art. According to the Sotheby’s Mei Moses Index, Jonas Wood’s average compound annual return is 41.1%, with prices rising for all his works.

Wood’s works are held in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.