Recent world events have provided an ever-growing palette of imagery for Jonny Green, although what informs the work is not so much the events themselves but rather the consequent cultural backwash. Green investigates our shifting understandings of contemporary life through his unique painted collage compositions executed with varying levels of playfulness.
Infatuated with the language of history painting, specifically 1860s paintings by Albert Bierstadt and Hudson River Group, Green subverts common interpretations offering a new kind of engagement to navigate current manias surrounding the end of reason and the apocalypse. Drawing upon a rich tapestry of experiences born through a long period touring as a professional musician, Green’s artworks addresses the sense of dissociation one develops from incessant world travel and excessive engagement with TV, films and other forms of digital content. His final paintings allude to Bierstadt, CGI, video games, hollywood to the contemporary progressive rock music of PJ Harvey.Deliberately crafted with non-localised colour Green affirms their unreality and hallucinatory, dream-state nature. The work is therefore non-didactic with the emphasis on presenting and playing with ideas rather than pushing one philosophical viewpoint.
Green identifies his work most closely with the emerging discourses of Metamodernism – an oscillation between beliefs, expectations, irony, passion, apathy, enthusiasm, collective states of mind and the past, present and future.
Jonny Green graduated from the Royal College of Art, MA Fine Art Painting, following on from completing a BA (hons) Fine Art Painting at Norwich School of Art. By the time he left college he was already represented in numerous public and international private collections (including: Deutsche Bank, Hull City Art Gallery, Sony, TI Group). He is a recipient of multiple awards (including: Artist in Residence at Delfina Studios, ICI Scholarship Fund Award, and Richard Ford Travel Awards) and has exhibited extensively across the UK, and internationally including: New York, Rome, Milan, Paris, Los Angeles and Tokyo. In 1995 he was presented with the opportunity to pursue a career in music and decided to take a ‘short’ break from his painting career, which would also give him new perspectives for his future work. This ‘break’ unintentionally led to 10 years traveling the world as a professional musician, releasing 5 studio albums, working on 3 movie soundtracks, and several TV ads. Green has been featured in various press including: Art Review, The Independent, Evening Standard and Modern Painters. .Jonny Green Lives and works in London.
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