Founded in 2021, NISO is committed to supporting the next generation of talents as well as rediscovering the legacy of XXth Century artists whose remarkable contributions to Art History have gone unnoticed in recent times. Located in Central London, the gallery provides a dynamic platform to present solo exhibitions and intergenerational dialogues in collaboration with artists, estates, and representing galleries. 

NISO has been committed to supporting the next generation of talents as well as rediscovering the legacy (...)

Supporting early-career artists, rediscovering overlooked masters from the XXth Century. 

Sawako Nasu (Tokyo, b. 1998) lives and works in Tokyo, Japan. The artist holds a BFA and MFA from the Tokyo University of Arts. Solo exhibitions include: Sunny, Rainy at Biscuit Gallery, Tokyo, Japan (2023); Slipped Moonlight, Ginza Tsutaya Books, Tokyo, Japan (2022); To the Lighthouse, myheirloom, Tokyo, Japan (2022). Recent group exhibitions include: Biscuit Gallery 3rd Anniversary Exhibition「grid3」, Biscuit Gallery, Tokyo (2024); Inaugural Group Exhibition, NISO, London (2024);「Selection」, KEN NAKAHASHI, Tokyo, Japan (2024); Draw Lines & Shapes in My Maps, Taka Ishii Gallery Maebashi, Maebashi, Japan (2023).

Landscape n.1, 2024   120 x 170 cm   Oil on Canvas

Landscape n.2, 2024   80 x 100 cm   Oil on Canvas

Landscape n.3, 2024   56 x 74 cm   Oil on Canvas

Landscape n.4, 2024   56 x 71 cm   Oil on Canvas

Landscape n.5, 2024   56 x 71 cm   Oil on Canvas

Landscape n.6, 2024   56 x 71 cm   Oil on Canvas

Installation view of Vestige, NISO, London, September 2024.

Portrait of A Man n.1, 2024   50 x 41 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.2, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.3, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.4, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.5, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.6, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

Portrait of A Man n.7, 2024   40 x 31 cm   Oil on Canvas 

A virtuoso in portraiture and travel painting – Proctor’s mostly autobiographical works freely depict the artist’s surroundings. Delicate renderings in watercolour relate quotidian scenes ranging from the landscapes he encountered on his bohemian wanderings from the Middle East to Asia “Kyoto, Golden Temple, Rain” (1991) to the intimate portraits of friends, lovers and colleagues made from the comfort of in his living room “Portrait of Richard Buckle” (1968), “Peter Hinwood”(1969). A chronicle of daily life as an artist, a dandy, and an integral member of the swinging sixties, Procktor’s honest reflections deeply resonate with the modern-day documentation of life in the digital Age.

Marked by a unique and understated painterly language that blends traditional and contemporary influences – Procktor’s portraits reveal a subdued and pasty palette and lingering atmosphere redolent of the pre-pop ‘Euston Road’ artistic movement, combined with an audacious use of white space that parallels the aesthetic modernity of the time. Marked by a non-hierarchical way of seeing, extraneous detail is opted out, figures carefully poised within the white space of the paper - some with mannerist distortions – coming together in a gentle and elegant quality that is muted in its transparency and deliberate areas of unpainted surface.

Balanced with an equal measure of finesse and flair – the subjects of Procktor’s portraits unveil a colourful melee of artists, musicians, designers, photographers and socialites that relay to the audience a generational snapshot of the milieu of art, theatre, fashion and rock music the artist inhabits.

Among them, some of the greatest figures of the era as well as many queer icons such as his friend the artist David Hockney and fashion designer Ossie Clark, interior designer Christopher Gibbs, Richard Beer, Peter Schlesinger, Mo McDermott, David Gwinnett, Francis Bacon, Mick Jagger, Jimi Hendrix, and Cecil Beaton; making up an almost complete cast of the ‘swinging’ London of the 60s and 70s.

Seemingly unguarded, Procktor’s portraits and renderings show a recurring - almost voyeuristic - depiction of the male figure – as carefree bodies recline half- naked “Brittas Bay” (1968), baking in the summer heat in parks “Lawn” (1975), or on the decks of boats “Tropic of Cancer”(1974). Conjuring airs of queer eros and nonchalance, these epitomise much of the liberal revolution of the time, where accepted norms of behaviour, sexual and otherwise, were being jettisoned for a new age of social freedoms.

A charismatic dandy renowned for his Wildean theatricality and wit, Procktor was one of the UK’s most controversial and enigmatic figures. Spanning several decades, his work compassed diverse styles and mediums, subject to significant acclaim as well as controversy over his lifetime. First gaining recognition the year after his graduation, his first show at the Redfern was a sell-out before it opened. The following year, Bryan Robertson selected him for the seminal 1963 exhibition “New Generation” at the Whitechapel, exhibiting his early paintings – dynamic, abstract depictions of the male nude – alongside those of the most promising artists of his time Patrick Caulfield, John Hoyland, Bridget Riley and David Hockney. With subsequent tendencies that included the out-of-vogue medium of watercolour, paired with the thematic monotony of his 1968 ‘One Boy Show’ fiasco - Procktor’s acclaim would never reach that of his close friend and muse David Hockney. By the mid-90s, doomed by alcoholism and a series of personal disasters that included a fire that destroyed his home and much of his art, brief spells of incarceration and homelessness quickly ensued, blighting the later years of his life.

Today, his prints, watercolours, and oil and acrylic paintings sit in private and public institutions including the British Museum, the Tate, the National Portrait Gallery, The Los Angeles County Museum, the Metropolitan Museum (NY), and the MoMA (NY), subject to a particular resurgence since the publishing of Ian Massey’s major monograph “Patrick Procktor: Art and Life” in 2010. Spotlights include Tate Britain's survey show of watercolourists in 2011 and Queer British Art exhibition in 2017, as well as his acclaimed retrospective at Huddersfield Art Gallery in 2012, and the eponymous exhibition at Palazzo Bentivoglio (Bologna) “A View From A Window” in 2022.

Centering on perceptions of the world around us, ‘Cirrus: On Landscape’, at NISO, is a group show placing in dialogue emerging and historical artists, spanning Europe to Latin America and Asia. Taking its cue from a type of cloud - cirrus, a wispy genus that is distinctive for its movement and shifting - the exhibition, curated by Jenn Ellis, explores forms of landscape painting. Pointing to the evolving nature of our perceptions, the exhibition explores the tradition from art historical approaches at different points in time to distinctive geographic vantage points. Drawing connections between more descriptive or precise articulations over to more emotionally-inclined interpretations of the natural environment, ‘Cirrus: On Landscape’ investigates how landscapes - as we see or remember it - have inspired artists across centuries and continents. Including works by Jamiu Agboke, Alexandre Calame, Pierre-Athanase Chauvin, Francesco Cima, Janus La Cour, Katy Moran, Sawako Nasu, SALVO, Ulf Saupe, Alexandre Wagner and José Antonio da Silva, the exhibition poses itself as a pan-temporal contemplation of the observed, felt and interpreted world around us. 

Opening the exhibition and in the heart of the first room is a work, exhibited publicly for the first time, by SALVO (1947-2015, Italy), whose practice is principally categorised by their richly coloured metaphysical landscapes and cityscapes. ‘Bosnia Erzegovina’ (2006), in its citric hues and modernist articulations of a place, reflects SALVO’s emblematic approach of creating simplified, hyper-saturated compositions that imply abstract concepts like time and memory. Flanked on either side by variations of mnemonic feeling, the triumvirate on the leftmost wall is composed of Francesco Cima (b. 1990, Italy) and Ulf Saupe (b. 1975, Germany). Cima’s work, with its delicate ochre and burgundy hues, depicts with magnanimity and expanse a tall, foliage-filled forest, the roots of each tree trickling through the earth like tributaries. Akin to SALVO, there is a saturation of colour, albeit distinctly more sombre, and there is a comparative sense of pictorial mystery. The landscape is distant, as if a treasured component of his imagination. Saupe shares elements of introspection and a consciousness of journey; his works, which expand on the medium of photography, explore the balance between humanity and nature. Sensitive to process and the incorporation of elements in his pieces themselves, his works encompass mediums from soil and gold leaf, to pigment and pulverised coal

Extending our considerations of memory and journey-making in the context of an exploration of landscape is a further dialogue, on the rightmost wall, between Katy Moran (b. 1975, UK) and Jamiu Agboke (b. 1989, Nigeria). Moran, in her language of abstraction, conjures atmospheres. Thinking of the landscape from a place of external and internal observation, her paintings are rooted in process and the collection and re-articulation of readymade objects - prior found paintings, frames - which have given way to a new gestural release. Delving into feelings of longing, impression and association, is the work of Agboke. Articulating an observed and recollected terrain, the emphasis turns to one of gesture and movement. Sensorial, the tones of the sky evoke a warmth, a hue that speaks to a geographic and temporal particularity where the sun sets or rises distinctly. As if recollecting a vivid memory, Agboke, like Moran, seem to evoke moments in colour and gesture, in texture and tone, a freedom of wrist being most akin to what’s been perceived and recollected. 

On the opposite wall to SALVO are two works by José Antonio da Silva (b. 1909-1996, Brazil), an iconic  self-taught artist from Brazil’s rural, labouring classes, who shifted the nation’s relationship and pathway with modern art. Initially working the land as a labourer on coffee, sugar and cotton plantations, da Silva turned to making art at the age of thirty-seven. Distinct to his practice is his contemplation and correlated criticality of the agricultural landscape; exploring on the one hand the riches of the earth, da Silva equally points to its exploitation by industry and how it’s being reshaped forever. ‘Untitled’ (1980), for example, depicts a lush, crop-encircled home; the scene, however, is balanced by the presence of two crosses, rising from the soil, and several leafless trees. Birds are seen circulating in the distance, a seemingly ominous sign. 

 ‘Untitled’ (1984) is even more explicit in its relational critique with modernity: a railroad weaves its way through a forest, a locomotive being at once a sign of the future in progress, while in tandem a tree has been visibly logged on the right. Presenting an important and alternative reflection of memory to the room, da Silva questions the merits of progress, and introduces a consideration of the economic as well as romantic associations with the land that surrounds and makes us. 

Entering the second room, we are introduced to more subliminal and pictorial considerations of landscape, exploring the range between observation and expression. In the centre back wall is a masterpiece by Janus Andreas Bartholin la Cour (b. 1837-1909, Denmark), entitled ‘The Ruins of Bramante's Nymphaeum in Genazzano’ from 1870. Classically trained at the Eckersberg school and the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, la Cour travelled to Italy and Switzerland for inspiration. As the title suggests, the painting is of an archeological site to the southeast of Rome; delicate in its delineation, the stones seem to have been taken over by a hyperbolic overture of vegetation. The skies in the foreground, with their pinkish hues, emblematic of his cloudy yet glowing approaches to the sky. The work is placed in dialogue, on the leftmost wall, with two works by Sawako Nasu (b. 1996, Japan). As if extrapolating a detail from La Cour’s painting, Nasu is inspired, in her paintings, by classical techniques yet strives to balance and contrast these with the contemporary context she creates in. Evoking the unbridgeable distance as well as evolutions between the times of the past and her current present, Nasu’s work evokes landscape as a vision. Aware of being in a constantly shifting art history, her expansive works in their delicacy and attention to the horizon reflect on this element of renewal. 

Extending interpretations of the natural world around us is another dialogue, on the opposite wall, between two work by Alexandre Wagner (b. 1986, Brazil) and a historic masterpiece by Pierre-Athanase Chauvin (1774-1832, France). Thinking about the creating and visioning of space, Wagner’s works depict with gesture and rhythm confluences of forests, rivers and cliffs. Furtive, Wagner’s palette is that of earth tones, his strokes ones that combine vigour with lightness. By comparison, Chauvin trained at the Écôle des Beaux Arts in Paris and excelled in a neoclassical style, eventually moving to Rome in 1801-2 where he gained international prominence. Travelling to Naples and Florence in addition to his thence ‘native’ Rome, Italian views became the focus of his perspective; indeed, the work on display is entitled ‘Vue des Pins de la Villa Borghese / prise du derrière la Villa Médicis’, which translates as “view of the pines of the Villa Borghese, taken from behind the Villa Médicis”. Opting for delicate pictorial accuracy, the work gives the impression of having been created ‘en plein air’ or in the open air, rather than back in the studio. The pines additionally lend an element of depth, this feeling of witnessing from afar. From the soft skies to the seeming sways of the trees, however, an element of light movement is permitted to appear. 

In the final wall, there is a parting conversation between two works, which explore the extended nuances of the exhibition. On the one hand there is a third work by Katy Moran, which in its gestural releases bridges the themes explored across the two rooms, from memory to rhythm, landscape as something that’s observed but also felt, and the exploration of sensorial elements when it comes to the natural world around us that extends beyond our sight. On the other hand, there is a work by Alexandre Calame (1810-1864, Switzerland) who focused on the natural world with a pictorial leaning on subliminal fascination. Specialised in the Alps, his work varies between an observation of the geological world and a wonder of what it can behold. Capturing moments of natural beauty, Calame’s work encompasses a romantic spirit, depicting grandiose landscapes where nature, untamed by man, preserves its frailty, chisel and rawness. 

Ultimately ‘Cirrus: On Landscape’ explores our pluralistic and continuously evolving relationship with the natural landscape. From absolute admiration and observation over to depicting the inevitability of our own involvement - from the archeological sites in Italy over to the laboured erosion in Brazil - the exhibition points to an ever-shifting coexistence between man and nature. From moments of abstraction evoking memory and rhythm in contemporary works, over to details of greater expression as articulated through the skies and foliage in the classical masterpieces, ‘Cirrus: On Landscape’ investigates how things can quickly change, or indeed, are constantly evolving - how the world around us is a matter of our own perception and articulation.

Installation view of Cirrus: On Lanscape, November 2024. Courtesy of NISO, London.  

Study of Rocks At The Lake of The Four Cantons, c. 1855-1860 Alexandre Calame 30,5 x 24,5 cm



Rome, View of the Villa Borghese behind the Villa Medicis, 19th Century
Pierre-Athanase Chauvin 20,4 x 31 cm



Installation view of Cirrus: On Lanscape, November 2024. Courtesy of NISO, London. 

Never No Turning Back, 2024 Jamiu Agboke 30 x 25 cm 

Bosnia Herzegovina, 2006 SALVO 20 x 14 cm

Laminetta, 2024 Francesco Cima 60 x 50 cm

Centering on perceptions of the world around us, ‘Cirrus: On Landscape’, at NISO, is a group show placing in dialogue emerging and historical artists, spanning Europe to Latin America and Asia.

NISO

NISO

15.11—11.01.25

15.11—11.01.25

Artists

Sawako Nasu

Sawako Nasu

Patrick Procktor

Patrick Procktor

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