Once Upon a Time in the West

《Once Upon a Time in the West 》comprises a selection of new prints made on residency at Guanlan Printmaking Base in Shenzhen in November-December 2025 along with a group of recent paintings from 2025. The two halves of the exhibition are inter-related through their subject matter which is a contemporary & historical dialogue with the Masters of Western Painting between 1400 and 1900.

Deftly moving between a wide range of printmaking techniques including etching, spit bite-aquatint and screenprinting, Stephen Lawlor’s newest works possess the jewel-like palette and haunting presence which runs through his oeuvre.

This exhibition takes portraiture as its starting point, gradually abstracting the sitters’ likenesses until they can no longer meet the viewer’s gaze. Monarchs, courtesans, muses and Madonnas mingle, their features blurred and distorted, rendering them elusive and intangible. Lawlor’s paintings, though gestural and ambiguous also speak to the figure. Gathering within opulent interiors and lush landscapes, the inhabitants of Lawlor’s vignettes appear as vestiges of bygone worlds, eras only familiar to us through the lens of the Western art canon.

Herein lies the paradox of Lawlor’s practice. Despite his deep commitment to skill and reverence for mastery, his working methods and juxtapositions are imbued with a self-awareness that is decidedly contemporary. The specificity of Lawlor’s vision is inseparable from the era of its conception. The Dutch Golden Age, La Belle Epoch, Rococo, Baroque are all revisited and deconstructed, and in the process new and uncertain worlds emerge. Traversing time and space, the rise and fall of empires and dynasties, decadence and austerity, we find ourselves confronted by the unknown and the unknowable, dreams that recall the dreams of those that came before us. Performances of power, aspirations of status and an unapologetic aesthetic luxuriance transform, in the artist’s hands, into new myths.

As we collectively reckon with the legacy of colonisation and imperialism, the folly of the wealthy and pretentions of the powerful strike a very different chord than they once did. Stephen Lawlor’s ghostly subjects capture the tension between the immortality of artistic expression, and the complex power structures embedded within the historical context of European Painting.

Ria Czerniak-LeBov

Dublin, Ireland 2026

追忆似水年华

《追忆似水年华》展出的作品由两部分组成：一是2025年11至12月艺术家在深圳观澜版画基地驻留期间创作的新版画，另一组是艺术家近1-2年绘画。两个系列在主题上相互关联，共同构建起与15至19世纪西方绘画大师跨越时空的当代对话。

斯蒂芬·劳勒游刃于蚀刻、飞尘腐蚀及丝网印刷等多元版画技法，其最新创作延续了贯穿始终的珠宝般璀璨色调与萦绕不散的视觉感染力。

本次展览以肖像为原点，逐步消解被绘者的面容特征，直至他们再也无法与观者对视。君主、名媛、缪斯与圣母在此交织，模糊扭曲的轮廓令这些形象变得难以捉摸、虚无缥缈。劳勒的绘画虽充满姿态性的模糊表达，却始终未曾背离对人物形态的诉说。他笔下的叙事场景聚集于华丽内室与葱郁风景中，那些居民宛若消逝世界的残影——那些我们仅能通过西方艺术经典透镜窥见的似水年华。

这正是劳勒创作中的悖论所在：纵然怀揣对传统技艺的虔诚敬畏，其创作手法与并置方式却浸润着鲜明的当代自觉。他独具慧眼的观察视角与其所处的时代密不可分。荷兰黄金时代、美好年代、洛可可、巴洛克——这些艺术史上的璀璨篇章被逐一解构重构，在创作过程中催生出扑朔迷离的新世界。穿越时空维度，遍历帝国兴衰，见证奢靡与克制，我们终将直面那些不可知亦不可解之物——那些与先人梦境遥相呼应的当代幻梦。权力的展演、地位的渴求、不加掩饰的审美奢靡，在艺术家手中蜕变为新的迷思。

当殖民与帝国扩张的遗产遭遇集体反思，昔日财富的虚妄与权贵的矫饰已然激荡出迥异往昔的回响。斯蒂芬·劳勒笔下幽灵般的主角，精准捕捉了艺术表达的不朽性与深嵌于欧洲绘画历史语境中的复杂权力结构之间的尖锐张力。

里亚·切尔尼亚克-勒博夫

都柏林，爱尔兰2026