Kevin Kavanagh is pleased to present Disguise the Limit, an exhibition of new work by Nevan Lahart.
The paintings in Disguise the Limit are serenely beautiful. Lahart pictures the vast expanse of the sky; initially appearing as traditional skyscapes, this contextualisation is swiftly derailed by the inclusion of strange and suspicious cloud formations. Jet streams left in the wake of unseen aircraft allude to nefarious activities and environmental interventions. Plumes, halos, and streams of condensation cling to currents at various altitudes to create an array of patterns in which peculiar anthropomorphic swirls occur and ominous shapes evoke changes in the atmosphere.
Through the medium of paint, Lahart illuminates the signs and signifiers in our immediate environment that often elude us. His work utilises a wide variety of materials to pose questions on topics that interest him. This recent suite of paintings, in which strange shapes appear in the sky incorporate his interest in alternative histories. Through the work, he emphasises the dynamic that exists between fabrication and fact. By considering Lahart’s practice in this context, it can be regarded as a means of discussing and challenging histories and mechanisms of power that are often determinately approved as fact.
Lahart challenges our propensity to form a consensus on events and thus relegate them to false history and through Disguise the Limit, he encourages us to question the avenues of information in which we blindly trust. Many of the installations and paintings within this exhibition urge us to consider other ways of knowing, other ways of coming to terms with the world around us. His work beckons us to pay attention to alternative theories and their potential to tell us truths that have been obscured in the past for reasons both benign and malevolent.
