Olsen Gruin is presenting Good Boy, an exhibition of recent works by Australian artist Rhys Lee. This striking show features a collection of paintings inspired by a single image – an orange interpretation of Pluto dressed in white gloves and a blue bow tie – painted on a New York City subway car in the 1970s by graffiti artist Mitch 77. Lee repeats and transforms this image, adding to, subtracting from, and abstracting its colour and form. Working intuitively, he is directed by the work, allowing each mark to inform the next. Vividly formed with rich, gestural and illustrative applications of paint, these figures brilliantly evolve to project their own scenarios and personalities. With each new painting, however, key elements of Mitch 77’s Pluto remain. Good Boy develops an aesthetic and poetic visual narrative through repetition. For Lee, the process
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