Joseph Hart’s work is an amalgamation of premeditated and spontaneous mark making, instinct and restraint, effort and error. Utilizing drawing, painting and cut-paper collage, his work is structured around cursory gestures: errant dashes, quick lines, scrawls, swoops and zigzags. This set of preliminary and exploratory maneuvers are then built upon, reconfigured or impulsively edited out until a composition begins to emerge. In his paper pieces, smaller scale drawings are often grafted directly into larger works, interrupting the initial picture plane while also reactivating it. The results are abrupt yet manage to achieve a bizarre and unexpected elegance.

 

Adaptation and balance play critical roles in Hart’s practice. Direction and orientation (vertical, horizontal, or other) typically remain in flux throughout his process, facilitating discovery through attempt. Moments of aesthetic beauty are evened by calculated blemish and visual apathy. Areas of careful consideration and casual awkwardness are forced to co-exist. Through this democratization of components and ideas, Hart emphasizes the relationships between turmoil, tension and harmony. 

 

Originally from New Hampshire, Joseph Hart is a Brooklyn, New York-based artist. His work has recently been exhibited at Galleri Jacob Bjorn in Denmark, Romer Young Gallery in San Francisco, Dieu Donné
 
and Halsey Mckay Gallery in New York, among others. Hart’s work has also been included in notable shows at the Frans Masareel Center in Belgium, Bronx Museum of the Arts, and Santa Monica Museum of Art. He has been featured in periodicals such as FlashArt, Modern Painters, Huffington Post and The New York Times. His work is in the public collections of The Rhode Island School of Design, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Hart holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design.