Exterior. (Morning.) is a site specific environment that draws from Baroque quadratura: illusionistic ceiling painting that extends church architecture into the virtual heavens. Reimagined in the present, and within the ‘abstract’ geometry of a contemporary art space, Christopher Page’s installation proposes a Day-Glo heaven that radiates a synthetic pink light.

The large-scale ceiling painting is accompanied by a series of three objects that seem soft and supine, somewhere between modernist reclining figures and contemporary poolside loungers. These forms appear bathed in the glow of pink light from above. Upon very close inspection it might be noticed that the pink ‘light’ on their uppermost surface is an uncanny trompe l’oeil achieved with an extremely light dusting of pink pigment. They are therefore not discreet ‘sculptures’ but another face of the painting above, which together conspire to simulate incandescence where there is only luminescence – a purely optical light without
heat.

The title of the exhibition is phrased like a stage direction, implying that the environment is a theatrical substitute for real space. By transporting us to another place – a place on a knife-edge between the luxurious and the unnerving – Christopher Page returns us to the gallery as a space of illusion in which surrogates for human action await the drama of recognition.

Christopher Page (b. 1984, London) lives and works in Athens. His work combines hard geometry with soft illusion, collapsing traditions in the history of painting in order to think through the contradictions of today’s globalised visuality. He has an MFA in painting from the Yale School of Art and his work has been shown recently at Para Site (Hong Kong), Hunter/ Whitfield Gallery (London), Lord Ludd (Philadelphia), The Averard Hotel (London), Instituto Inclusartiz (Rio de Janeiro), Sushi Bar (New York) and Hannah Barry Gallery (London) as well as at art fairs internationally with LAMB Arts. Page has participated in artist residencies including Instituto Inclusartiz in Brazil and the Container Artist Residency 01, which takes place on container ships around the world.