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GR gallery. Jack Shure and Leegan Koo
12October
News

GR gallery. Jack Shure and Leegan Koo

GR Gallery is pleased to announce "Happy Hour" and "Some Strange Speckle of Truth", two concurrent solo exhibitions featuring artists Leegan Koo and Jack Shure. The shows will unveil the latest series of artworks that the artists has been working on for the past months. Appositely conceived for this occasion, this new body of works will independently spread across the gallery space, creating anunprecedented surreal contemporary atmosphere and celebrating both artists first solo exhibition in New York. The show will put together eighteen original pieces on canvas.

In "Happy Hour " Leegan  places well-known pop culture characters in a variety of imagined, unfamiliar scenes to create a certain atmospheric quality that shares with the viewers and to disrupt the fixed images of these characters. The viewers are encouraged to feel the moods and imagine a story, rather than "interpret" the meanings. It is about seeing and discovering something new from old and familiar, as well as tapping into the infinite possibilities of the scene shown in the painting.

On the other side in " Some Strange Speckle of Truth " Jack is Pulling imagery from both his childhood, currently and perhaps the future, simultaneously creating this body of work during a time of serious change. Letting go of formulas and subjects so new icons could arise, in a sort of an ego crucifixion where these weird artifacts are the byproduct. It's the beginning of something new but is also always changing. Not really interested in deliberately directing, just more riding the waves that come through and finding some "strange speckle of truth".

Jack Shure is an American artist currently based in Boulder, CO. He approaches Art as a practice of alchemy, not only in an aesthetic way but also intended as the alchemy of the soul, constantly processing, healing, transforming and transmuting. His goal is to give the viewer a portal or gateway into a sacred realm, to give them a piece of his interpretation of the sacred space that he experienced. To find their own sacred space within, to listen for the subtle but potent message that art can teach. "When we paint with an open heart and mind we see into who we have the potential to become and we put it all on the line for the world to see...silently". During the past 10 years he exhibited extensively, in group and solo shows, all across US and in Europe.
 
Leegan was born in Seoul, Korea. He began drawing and painting at a young age by himself. He grew up moving from one metropolitan city to another—Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City to name a few—and cultural diversity and experience of dynamic urban life became the major source of his artistic inspiration. In 2011, Leegan began to focus on painting cityscapes—a visual manifestation of memories and emotions attached to certain places—and experimented with various styles of realism and surrealism. In 2013, he moved to San Francisco to attend Academy of Art University where he received his first formal art education. In 2014, Leegan moved to Los Angeles and began his career as a freelance artist while working part-time for art companies that specialize in producing artworks for clients such as Crate and Barrel, Pottery Barn, and Z Gallery. He currently lives and works as a freelance artist in Bellingham WA.

Exhibition Dates: October 15 – November 14, 2021