Stephen Romano Gallery - David Molesky "Riot Paintings"

	FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
	Stephen Romano Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of a series of paintings by renowned artist David Molesky entitled "Riot Paintings". Opening reception Friday April 1st 2016 from 5 - 9 pm and continuing through May 1 2016. The exhibition is presented concurrently with "The Devil's Reign", in association with HOWL Gallery and curated by Peter Gillmore, the high priest of the Church of Satan.
	David Molesky "Molotov Toss"

	David Molesky is a Brooklyn-based painter and writer. He grew up in Washington DC, and moved west in 1995 to obtain his Bachelor of Arts from UC Berkeley (1999). In 2009, he returned to the US after an 18 month apprenticeship with the painter Odd Nerdrum in Iceland, Norway, and Paris. Molesky’s work has been featured in numerous museum exhibitions including: the Baltimore Museum of Art; Pasinger Fabrik, Munich, Germany; and the Grand Central Art Center of Cal State Fullerton. The Long Beach Museum of Art has recently added a painting from his series of hill fires to its permanent collection. Many publications including New American Paintings, The Surfers Journal, and Juxtapoz Magazine have featured Molesky and his work. David Molesky "Three Marauders"
	From the artist: "I like to imagine paint as primordial ooze that mimics the mysterious ever-changing preternatural substances. Like a force of nature, I conduct formlessness in my own microcosm of creation. And as I compose my images, I recognize the existential responsibility of these choices. In order to transform my canvas, I am often led on a path of momentary destruction, as are the subjects in the Riots. These paintings explore concepts of transformation and its relation to symbolic and actual acts of destruction. The action within these images stems from visceral desire to advance an overall situation and is propelled by the motivation and self-will of an individual. Agency as an internal force should be a given to all individuals. This is also represented by fire itself, which I paint such that it appears to be lit from within, without reliance on external light sources. The characters of the paintings, both the humans and fire, become cohorts in an evolutionary process of destruction; limbs and fire flicker into a landscape of chaos and churning elements. As instigators and perpetuators, my rioters enter a collaborative and harmonious dance with the elements. In opposition to depictions of man and fire as incongruous, I choose to have my two subjects feeding one another, working towards the same mission. There is only intimacy between them, no fear." - David Molesky David Molesky "Fire Feeders"
	SOLO EXHIBITIONS: 2016 Riot, Stephen Romano Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2015 Riot, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 2014 Riot, the fridge, Washington, D.C. Calm and Unrest, Copro Gallery, Santa Monica, CA 2013 A Long Moment, a.Muse Gallery, San Francisco, CA 2012 AIR/WATER, the fridge, Washington, D.C. 2011 Protean Dreams, Artspace 712, San Francisco, CA A Journey Back, 12 Gallagher Lane, San Francisco, CA Eclipse of an Undercurrent, Marjorie Evans Gallery, Sunset Cultural Center, Carmel, CA 2010 Turbulent Mirror, Rae Douglass Gallery, Berkeley, CA Spume, Canessa Gallery, San Francisco, CA GROUP EXHIBITIONS: 2016 Portraits, Modern Eden Gallery, San Francisco, CA 2015 Transmission, Cal State Lutheran University, Thousand Oaks, CA 20 years under the influence of Juxtapoz, Los Angeles Municipal Gallery, CA Opus Hypnagogia, Morbid Anatomy Museum, Brooklyn, NY Portal to the Future, Gregorio Escalante Gallery, Los Angeles, CA 2014 Enriching and Engaging, Long Beach Museum of Art, CA Pupils of Apelles, Copro Gallery, Santa Monica, CA 2013 Risqué, Long Beach Art Museum, Long Beach, CA Suggestivism Rome, Mondo Pop, Rome, Italy Surreal Salon, Baton Rouge Gallery for Contemporary Art, Louisiana SELECTED PRESS: 2015 OC Weekly. DAX Gallery Gathers Masters and Rookies. April 9, 2015 Juxtapoz. David Molesky @ The Fridge. January, 14, 2015 Washington City Paper. At the Fridge, Protest Fires Burn. January, 9 2015 East City Art. Review: David Molesky Riot @ the Fridge. January, 15 2015 2014 Huffington Post. “Pupils of Apelles at Copro Gallery: One cult, Two masters. John Seed. December 4, 2014. Juxtapoz. Riot paintings by David Molesky. May 6, 2014 Conversation & Context. Artfile Magazine. April 2014 2013 Works and Conversations. Whittaker, Richard. Infinite Water. May 2013 Juxtapoz. Risgué{Dirty Little Pictures}@Long Beach Art Museum. September 20, 2013 2012 The Surfers Journal. Escalante, Greg & Spoor, Nathan. Politics of Paint. vol 21.5, pg. 70-77 Washington Post. “Gallery Highlights in the fall Season.” September 8, 2012.
	David Molesky "Fire Bird" For further information and visuals please contact Stephen Romano Gallery at romanostephen@gmail.com or 6467094725

About Stephen Romano Gallery

Stephen Romano Gallery is a new addition to the Brooklyn art gallery community, having opened its doors in April of 2014 in Dumbo and having relocated to Bushwick in September 2015.

Prior to opening the current gallery, Stephen Romano was a private art dealer for 15 years specializing in masters of self-taught and visionary art such as Henry Darger, Martin Ramirez, Charles Dellschau, Bill Traylor, Darcilio Lima, and many others. The Gallery's most recent exhibition El Gato Chimney’s “De Rerum Natura” was well received and reviewed, as was the preceding exhibition "Trypophobia" by Colin Christian. Stephen Romano Gallery also mounted the most ambitious exhibition of works by pictorialist photographer William Mortensen to coincide with the release of the book "American Grotesque" published by Feral House.

Stephen Romano has been a participant in many art fairs including PULSE, The Metro Show, and the Outsider Art Fair.

In 2013, Stephen Romano produced a seminal 330-page monograph on visionary artist CHARLES DELLSCHAU designed by Marquand Books and distributed by DAP. The book generated several positive reviews from a wide variety of publications such as Bookforum, Raw Vision Magazine, The Atlantic, Slate, Antiques, and the arts and Design Observer, among many others. With an introduction by Stephen Romano, the book features the final published essay by renowned art writer Thomas McEvilley, as well as contributions from the founder of The Museum of Everything, James Brett, and the curator of Smithsonian Museum of Aerospace, Thomas Croutch.

In the same year, Romano also published the first ever post-mortem catalog of works by Brazilian visionary Darcilio Lima and most recently a catalogue of an previously unknown photographic series from 1925 by William Mortensen entitled "A Pictorial Compendium of Witchcraft," with an introduction by A.D. Coleman and essay by Tom Pattersen. Most recently, Stephen Romano Gallery had the honor of publishing a catalog of works by Pavel Kraus with an essay by David Ebony, as well as a catalog for Chinese artist Lu Zhang with essay by Robert C. Morgan. In 2015, the gallery produced a catalog of the "TRYPOPHOBIA" exhibition by Colin Christian with texts by Kris Kuksi, Allison C. Meier and Samuel D. Gliner. The most recent catalogs were published was on Italian artist El Gato Chimney with texts by Martin Wittfooth, Pamela Grossman and Michela D'Acquisto, "Opus Hypnagogia" with Morbid Anatomy Museum and Decadence Darling, Jel Ena and Rithika Merchant.

In the summer of 2015, Stephen Romano curated the highly acclaimed exhibition "Opus Hypnagogia" at Brooklyn's Morbid Anatomy Museum. The exhibition was featured in the New York Times, as well as Juxtapoz Magazine, Hi-Fructose, Beautiful Bizarre, Brooklyn Magazine, among many others. This exhibition was followed up in the new Bushwick gallery with "Lexicon Infernali" and a solo show by Rithika Merchant and "Magica Sexualis" and a solo show by Los Angeles artist Jel Ena, and "Charles Dellschau: American Visionary", the third ever solo exhibition of this seminal outsider artist ever organized and "Hieroglyphica" a companion group exhibition as well as "Matthew Dutton: Midnight Paracosm", Paul Booth "Selected Works" and "Saint Bowie".

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DIRECTIONS TO BUSHWICK GALLERY

contact romanostephen@gmail.com or 6467094725 for inquiries