Ian Monroe (b. 1972)

Ian Monroe (b. 1972)
Trench
signed, titled and dated 'IAN MONROE "TRENCH" 2005' (on the reverse)
vinyl on Perspex
7 x 11¾in. (17.7 x 29.7cm.)
Executed in 2005

PROVENANCE

Haunch of Venison, London.

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SPECIALIST NOTES

Ian Monroe’s works are modern trompe l’oeil, operating somewhere between paintings and sculptures. In all his works, the collage technique deployed gives high precision and solidity to his works, which recall computer designed landscapes. He uses the medium of collage with everyday materials such as Perspex and vinyl to create 2D depopulated spaces which depict imaginary geometrical structures. The influence of architecture infuses Monroe’s practice, intermingling with the modern movements of Constructivism and Suprematism that are ostensibly abundant sources of inspiration for his creations. The use of geometric forms, the extreme attention given to shapes and to their relationships to each other and the greater whole reflect the intellectual legacy of Russian avant-garde and especially Malevich. To that extent, Monroe’s work can be seen as a reviewed interpretation of Malevich’s ‘Architekton’ series, combined with a highly modern computer games aesthetics and a specific collage technique.

Through the use of collage described by the artist as an ‘active boundary where previously dissociated material is amalgamated’, Monroe explores the possibilities of spatial creation (I. Monroe, quoted in ‘Where Does One Thing End And The Other Begin?’, in C. Blanche, Collage: Assembling Contemporary Art, London, 2008, pp. 32-45). Using the vocabulary of French anthropologist, Marc Augé, Monroe describes therefore his landscapes as ‘no-where’; that is, spaces that do not echo reality. Indeed, unlike painting, collage leads to clear and unequivocal edges between the different shapes that only exist in schematic and theoretical representations. In this way, the landscapes Monroe creates are similar to the hypothetical and conceptual landscapes we construct in our minds in order to apprehend reality.

Born in New York in 1972, Ian Monroe currently lives and works in London where he completed his MA from Goldsmiths College, University of London, in 2002. His work was shown in 2003 in the opening exhibition of the Saatchi Gallery – an institution that today owns several works by the artist. In 2004 he was also included in the collective exhibition Edge of the Real held at the Whitechapel Gallery. He is currently exhibiting at Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Denmark and working on a public commission to be located in Leicester Square, London. Additionally, his work will be shown at a forthcoming solo exhibition at Horatio Junior, London in November 2015.

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