John Keane 'Guantánamerica' at Flowers Gallery, NYC

Friday, 27 October 2006 12:51

New York City - Flowers Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of new paintings by the British artist John Keane.  Keane’s Guantánamerica series of paintings grew from downloaded low-resolution digital images of the detainees at Camp X-Ray at the US military base of Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.  Many of the original photos released by the Pentagon in 2002 show the detainees kneeling and subjected to sensory deprivation upon their arrival at Camp X-Ray.  The detainees could be seen handcuffed and wearing goggles, ear muffs, surgical masks and heavy gloves.

As Keane abstracted these digital images of the prisoners on his computer, he noticed an analogy to the essential dehumanization of the internment itself.  From these manipulated images the paintings emerged, many of which show the iconic fluorescent orange suits of the prisoners.

The ambiguity of the submissive postures of the detainees interested Keane and brought to light certain questions - were they attitudes of submissive obedience to their captors, or could they be attitudes of prayer?  The low resolution of the digital images enhanced this ambiguity for the artist.

Further explorations on Keane’s computer revealed patterns not dissimilar to the kind of light interference effects observed when an oil film is dispersed on water.  Another analogy therefore suggested itself to the artist about the direct line of consequence between the political and military interference necessitated in the pursuit of diminishing oil reserves and the enmity generated in extreme Islamic belief.

John Keane was born in England in 1954.  Guantánamerica demonstrates the artist’s continued interest in global issues of conflict focusing on specific locations, as is the example of his appointment as official British war artist during the 1991 Gulf War.  He has exhibited internationally and his work is in public collections including Chase Manhattan Bank, New York; the BBC, England; Christie’s Corporate Collection; Glasgow Museums, Scotland; the Imperial War Museum, London; and the Detroit Institute of Fine Art, Michigan.