We are pleased to announce the first Berlin exhibition „Lean and Prop“ by British painter Nick Dawes. Alongside a group of abstract, bright paintings we are exhibiting a selection of small-format, monochrome pencil drawings.

Nick Dawes' painting process is usually a lengthy one and involves a gradual distillation of everything that makes a scene memorable: mood and atmosphere, feeling and emotions, bodily sensation and state of mind. His paintings provoke a personal response by the viewer; the focus being on their individual emotion rather than on the subject matter. Therefore feelings of empathy, affinity, even recognition are appropriate reactions to the work.

In Dawes' case succession is physically signified by a variety of means: by layering of one colour on top of another, via the orchestration and direction of the poured lines and shapes, and by the implication of sequential movements of the painter's hand.

We sense too, that the complexity of the surface is a necessary condition for the representation of complex emotions and feeling remains at the centre of Dawes's art. The paintings selected for this exhibition, as is always the case in Nick Dawes' work, require the viewer to engage with them in their own right. The title of the exhibition „Lean and Prop“ is a reference to the deep unity of the artist with his material. To lean and to prop are the two behaviour patterns that Dawes allows, indeed welcomes to the canvas in his working process.

From 1988 to 1989 Nick Dawes studied at Gloucestershire College of Art and Technology in the Art and Design Foundation Diploma course. This intense course brought him closer to his profession as an artist. The same year he started at the Polytechnic department at the University of Brighton and graduated with his Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1992. In 2006 Nick Dawes was nominated for the Celeste Art Prize. The artist's works have been shown in many exhibitions in Europe, such as the Galerie Lucy Mackintosh in Lausanne, Switzerland and the John Hansard Gallery in Southampton. His last big exhibition took place in the Turps Gallery in London. He lives and works in London.