Currently on view at Kate Werble Gallery, New York is “Face Paintings,” a solo exhibition by Lui Shtini, featuring a series of paintings that work together to form an army of indecipherable, hybrid personalities. The portraits read as an index of figures that come from an internal scene. Shtini’s childhood was spent in Albania during the 1980’s where he was exposed to the different influences of the upheaval of the political, social landscape in his country and an indirect art-book exposure to conventional Western art. His technique of close observation developed from processing the first-hand experience of a politically unstable country and his more detached introduction to the history of painting. Shtini’s visages in “Face Paintings” reflect the properties and texture of the paint. Though each painting comes across as a distinct persona, his subjects refuse to completely materialize and, in doing so, the works themselves deny an equation of knowledge with total visibility.

Lui Shtini, “Kurz”, 2013
Oil on board
20 1/2 x 16 1/2 inches
Courtesy of the gallery

“Face Paintings” is on view through January 4th, 2013.

For more information visit Kate Werble Gallery, New York.