Kate MacGarry have chosen to exhibit a solo selection of small-scale paintings on paper from the British-Japanese artist, Peter McDonald. McDonald is a prolific artist, and the many nuances of his work in such floor-to-ceiling display offer an enjoyable opportunity to slow down the pace of the fair and hone in on a singular practice.
The London-based artist approaches many daily activities in his works; disco dancefloors, football pitches and art galleries offer the sites for his works. And yet he elevates all of these to something notably ‘other’. Whilst human bodies are all rendered in a natural—if illustrative—style, each of McDonald’s characters heads have been replaced by a large, coloured bubble. A misshapen blob that extends outwards, at points crossing with another’s enlarged head, at times dripping lazily onto the surface beneath it, at others sliding, slug-like up the side of walls.
These heads you see are more like personal auras, the space occupied by the mind that may in some ways escape the physical confines of the skull. From these roundish shapes you can guess the many intricacies of character, whether that be a football coach’s head extended upwards in a pompous, enraged oblong or hanging slightly forwards, a dejected marker of a person under the weight of their own mind.
Despite the human angle, these works are often very amusing. The colours are bright and at times the painting is naive, offering a (well-trained) nod to the art of the unschooled. It’s fun to get involved with these many works and start to guess who is feeling what, and what your own big colourful blob head might be doing right now if McDonald were to depict you in this way.
Kate MacGarry can be found at stand B2 at Frieze London until 17 October
