Corey Helford Gallery Features New Works by Josh Agle (Shag)

Written by Fiona Claverhouse Sunday, 12 February 2012 22:39

Los Angeles, California.- Corey Helford Gallery is proud to present the highly-anticipated exhibition of new works by Southern California artist Josh Agle, better known as “Shag”. Entitled “Animal Kingdom,” his second solo exhibition with the gallery was named while painting in his studio during the Kentucky Derby. “I heard that a Thoroughbred named Animal Kingdom had won the Kentucky Derby. Since the painting I was working on had a horse in it, and all the paintings for the exhibit featured animals, it seemed to sum up the body of work I was making”. "Animal Kingdom" will be on view at the gallery from February 11th through March 7th. Recognized worldwide, Agle’s iconic imagery celebrates commercial art from the 1950s and 1960s and is infused with playful narratives about consumerism and hedonism. “Ironic humor, impending trouble, or unexplained situations are common elements in most of my work,” Agle notes.

For “Animal Kingdom,” his new collection of paintings returns to brighter and happier times. “Colors have become more radiant, and the men and women in the paintings seem happier and more satisfied in their hedonistic lifestyles”. Inspired by vintage animal costumes, Furry fandom and anime characters who dress as animals, all of the paintings in the exhibition feature men and women in animal attire. The concept for the show was inspired by a 1970s sewing pattern for an animal costume. While the body remained the same, the ears and tail for each animal changed, transforming it into a tiger, a bunny, a bear or a mouse. Agle adds, “I’ve noticed a lot of teenagers and hipsters recently wearing hoodies and beanies with animal ears, antlers or horns. Maybe there is a subconscious societal urge to return to our animalistic natures. This is a theme I’ve flirted with in the past, but never this directly.”


Josh Agle is a painter and designer from Los Angeles who is probably better known by the name he signs on his paintings, “Shag.” Agle has spent the last decade creating a body of work based on his idiomatic aesthetic preference, a world of mid 20th century modern architecture and design, populated by hedonists, supplicants, and indifferent women. The paintings themselves celebrate consumerism and consumption on vividly colored, sharply rendered panels; the characters drink, smoke and eat in lavish, stylish surroundings. But Agle sees the visuals of his work as window-dressing or stage scenery. He’s more concerned with the narrative of the art. “Most of my paintings are set in the middle of a story or situation -- characters are interacting and reacting to each other and to outside events.” Agle doesn’t offer too many clues about the stories, preferring that the viewer create his or her own narratives to fit the situations.

While Shag’s work might easily be dismissed as retro-kitsch, the influential New York Times art critic, Roberta Smith, has called his painting catchy and witty, saying “the eye is snared by Mr. Agle’s economic use of saturated colors -- sharp greens and warm lavenders, smoldering reds, sour ochres -- and the tinted-gel space created by his thin-on-thin paint handling.” Interest by museum curators and academics culminated with a solo exhibition of his work at the Laguna Art Museum in early 2008.


Located in the Culver City Art District, Corey Helford Gallery was established in 2006 by Jan Corey Helford and her husband, television producer and creator, Bruce Helford (Anger Management, The Drew Carey Show, George Lopez, The Oblongs). Corey Helford Gallery exhibits a diverse collection of Contemporary artists influenced by today’s pop culture, encompassing the genres of New Figurative, Pop Surreal, Graffiti and Street Art. Artists include Josh Agle (Shag), Ray Caesar, D*Face, Chloe Early, Ron English, Natalia Fabia, Kukula, Lola, The London Police, Sylvia Ji, Eric Joyner, Michael Mararian, Brandi Milne, Buff Monster, Risk, Amy Sol, Martin Wittfooth, and Nick Walker. Renowned for its notable exhibitions, the gallery has presented “Charity By Numbers,” which was co-curated by Gary Baseman and featured an unprecedented lineup of artists including Mark Ryden, Marion Peck, Shepard Fairey, Todd and Kathy Schorr, Camille Rose Garcia, and Michael Hussar, as well as “La Noche de la Fusion,” an epic Carnivalesque festival and solo exhibition for Pervasive artist Gary Baseman. In 2010, Corey Helford Gallery partnered with Bristol’s City Museum & Art Gallery for the transatlantic collaboration “Art From The New World,” a world-class United Kingdom museum exhibition showcasing

work by a formidable group of 49 of the finest emerging and noted American artists. Corey Helford Gallery presents new exhibitions approximately every four weeks. Visit the gallery's website at ... http://www.coreyhelfordgallery.com

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