Modern History Volume 1

Abstract

Title: Modern History Volume 1
Exhibition: The Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool
Date: 24/04/2015 — 13/06/2015
Curated by Lynda Morris

Alker had four paintings selected for the exhibition Modern History Volume 1. This group of paintings are part of an ongoing series in which the artist investigates the temporal condition of painting using unorthodox and impermanent grounds. In this case commercially produced post-it notes. Thematically this group of works explore the relationship between painting, landscape and cinematic narrative.
The exhibition curator was Lynda Morris and Modern History Volume 1 took place at the Grundy Art Gallery in 2015. Modern History was a survey show of contemporary art practice seen in the context of historical discourse in the ‘modern’ era. This was work 'reflecting on historical change, particularly since the 1960s, or by looking at the global historical moment we are in'

In the text Morris articulates the relationship between dramatic narrative and painting in the post-it note paintings
'David Alker’s four tiny paintings on pads of post-it notes, are paintings of pictures. His subject matter is gas stations from .. movies of a certain age. The quality of his paintings echoes a memory of Edward Hopper. Alker is painting a European view of US visual culture, a kind of reversal of Pop Art'
Alker’s research into landscape, cinema and film narrative in Modern History is an extension of an earlier series titled the silver’s been gone for 40 years. These principally text-based works were shown in the exhibition COMMONWEALTH curated by Denise Hawrysio for MKG127, Toronto in 2009.
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