Gabriele Grones: Sacred Connections
Opening: January 19, 2023, 6-8 PM
Exhibition: January 19 - March 2, 2024
Download the catalog in PDF.
SARAHCROWN is pleased to announce the solo exhibition, Sacred Connections, featuring new works by Italian artist Gabriele Grones. The exhibition will open on January 19 and run through March 2, 2024. Sacred Connections showcases a brand-new series of oil paintings on canvas that focuses on the symbology of the four sacred plants to Northeastern Native Americans in diverse cultures: cedar, sage, sweetgrass, and tobacco. Central to the installation is a complex polyptych dedicated to the cedar tree accompanied by additional works highlighting the other three plants.
As an artist, Gabriele Grones explores the symbology used in art by various cultures. More specifically, he investigates the relationship we form with reality through established visual codes of art history. In this new series —started during his residency at RU Residency Unlimited (Brooklyn. NY) in 2023— Grones turned his lens toward these four sacred plants and explored common iconographies and artifacts present in various cultures around the world. His paintings depict ceremonial objects, artworks, ancient paintings, and religious icons highlighting syncretic cultural interactions and unique relics of cultural heritage.
In his historical and anthropological research, Grones came across artifacts, ceremonial objects, and spiritual practices intrinsically associated with these sacred plants. Those findings constitute the subjects of these new paintings. For example, the wood of the Cedar tree has been used for centuries to create ceremonial artifacts (masks, rattles, vessels), as an incense, and purifying herb. It has also been used to carve sculptures and funerary figurines of personalities of power and spirituality (kings, saints, shamans). In ancient paintings, architectural details (arches, frames, altar pieces) are depicted in cedar wood as a signifier for nobility and fame. Analog concepts apply to the other plants sage, tobacco, and sweetgrass which Grones uncovers through his meticulous depictions and visual associations.
The individual paintings within Sacred Connections reveal captivating tales of ancient artifacts and mystical rituals. When observed collectively, these artworks reveal deep-rooted connections shared through plants and across diverse cultures, societies, and continents.
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalog with an essay by the artist himself detailing the history and significance of every subject of these paintings. The exhibition will run from January 19 to March 2, 2024, Thursdays- Saturdays, and by appointment. For press images and more information please contact info@sarahcrown.com.
