Can't see (how full my hands are) 42x60 inches acrylic on wood

Maybe it’s the free flowing, curvaceous human forms inside artist Alex Gardner’s paintings that make him easily labeled as a surrealist. He would kindly disagree. “It's figurative,” the artist explains, “It's representational. I'm just trying to speak about life.”

The Los Angeles based painter, who recently debuted his collection at London’s The Dot Project, uses his brush as a mode to help people remember the real values in life; as so many are relentlessly chasing time and excess. Our days are limited and the days of our loved ones are limited, making Gardner’s artwork necessary to the now.

“Alex creates sculptural yet expressive figurative work set in a minimal geometric landscape. He draws on influence from Renaissance painters in the way to pose and gesture the figures to purposefully guide the eye through the composition. He relies solely on the figure and it’s interaction with simple shapes, and sometimes plants, to create ambiguous narratives. The aim of his work is to convey the mood and emotion of a specific life event without explicitly describing the event itself. The anonymous figures allow viewers to project themselves into the narrative while also depicting issues of identity. Gardner explores human nature and reoccurring themes such as desire, ethics and anxiety, which are often juxtaposed with the notion of leisure. Gardner’s African and Japanese heritage has an influence in his work. Having travelled extensively to both regions, he uses these personal experiences as inspiration and aims to create relatable visual narratives through stark figurative compositions.”

— Excerpt from The Dot Project

Classical painters, who spent a lifetime honing their technique, seeking higher truths through their paintings, greatly inspire Gardner. Taking their queue, the painter was formally educated at California State University, Long Beach, where he received a BFA in Fine Arts; practicing his craft before showcasing to the world.

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