Her new large-scale gestural paintings are built up through layers of acrylic paint on canvas, weaving transparent and opaque streams of liquid through negative space. She pours, brushes, prints, rolls and folds paint, propagating a choreography of marks that mirror the bilateral architecture of the body and its movement through environments of human habitation. By creating layered sets of mirrored applications and motifs she suggests an empirical yet ecstatic set of similes for the viewer to contemplate from an indivisible visual and emotional perspective.

The exhibition takes its name from a new painting, Nightjars and Allies, which will be installed in the downstairs gallery. This is the largest scale at which the artist has worked, as she continues to explore positive and negative interplay in her works by creating a constant illusion between distance and proximity. She skilfully stirs the attention of the viewer, who reacts directly to the composition while simultaneously contemplating the suggestion of narrative and subject.

Elizabeth Neel (b. 1975) currently lives and works in New York. She graduated from Columbia University with an MFA in 2007. Recent solo exhibitions include: Tangled on the Serpent Chair, Mary Boone Gallery (2018); Claw Hammer, Susanne Vielmetter, Los Angeles Projects (2017); Vulture and Chicks, Pilar Corrias Gallery, London (2016); Lobster with Shell Game, Susanne Vielmetter, Los Angeles Projects (2015); The People, the Park, the Ornament, Pilar Corrias, London (2014); 3 and 4 before 2 and 5, Sikkema Jenkins & Co, New York (2013); Routes and Pleasures, Susanne Vielmetter, Los Angeles Projects (2012); Sphinx Ditch, Pilar Corrias, London (2011); Leopard Complex, Sikkema Jenkins & Co, New York (2011); Stick Season, curated by Fionn Meade at SculptureCenter, New York (2010). Her work has been shown in group exhibitions at Victoria Miro, London (2018); Moore Building, presented by Larry Gagosian and Jeffrey Deitch, Miami Beach (2017); Leo Xu Projects, Shanghai (2016); Howick Place, London (2014); Lori Bookstein Fine Art, New York (2014); STUDIOLO, Zurich (2012); Cluj Museum, Cluji-Napoca (2012); Prague Biennale 5 (2011); and Mother’s Tank Station, Dublin (2011).