Kenny Scharf
Elroy Vision
Legends Gallery
3318 Washington
Opening Reception June 6th from 6 – 8 PM
In collaboration with Lococo Fine Art Publisher, Legends’ Gallery presents an exhibition of prints, sculptures, and original works that celebrate the humor, fantasy, joy, and emotion that have defined Kenny Scharf’s practice over the years.
The exhibition will also feature a selection of Scharf merchandise and debut a new limited-edition print celebrating his recent mural, Kranzbergville 4 Eva, completed last fall at Walls Off Washington.
Image courtesy of and credited to Lococo Fine Art Publisher.
ARTIST STATEMENT
This exhibition of prints, sculptures, objects, and original work celebrates the humor, fantasy, joy, and emotion of Scharf’s work over the years. These landscapes, furungles, schrungles, woodz, fuzzoodz, worldz, earth and space, still lifes, and objects are like portals into a surreal multiverse of his imagination. Focusing on Scharf’s work in printmaking, and the medium’s ability for multiples and variations in color and other techniques, the prints become these alternate realities of the original. Borrowing from cartoons, science fiction, pop culture and a fantasy his own, he references concerns such as the environment, technology, and war, but within those spaces, he also creates such joy and whimsy from the creatures that fill them. Like escaping reality, by the means of creating within it and giving the viewer the opportunity to do the same. Scharf’s inclination to use garbage or an old television and transform it into something precious like in his 2021 painting Samsung Ploatz is like a personal alchemy for transmuting trash into treasure. In an interview, he’s asked about still making work and his creative energy.
He responds, “I feel like I’m just beginning. You start with nothing, and then there is this creation, and it’s very satisfying. I rely on my skills and my own history and the things that I love, that I’m obsessed with. I feel they’re coming from somewhere else, and they come through me, and they come out of me. Often people ask me, “What do you do when you have an artist block?” I’ve never had an one, because I reach out into the universe, and the universe is so infinite.”
ARTIST BIO
Kenny Scharf (born in 1958, in Hollywood, California) received his BFA in 1980 at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Part of the 1980’s East Village Art movement, his distinct Pop-Surrealism style pushed the boundaries of painting and street art. His works have since been exhibited internationally and his murals can be seen across the world. Scharf’s multi-disciplinary practice including painting, sculpture, performance, murals, video, fashion, street art reflects his passion for creating. He recently completed two murals in St. Louis at Walls on Washington. Scharf currently works and resides in Los Angeles, CA.
