NEW YORK, NY.- Philippe Labaune Gallery presents Narrative Images, an exhibition of paintings and original comic strips by French American artist Miles Hyman. This will be the debut of Miles Hyman's paintings in New York. Informed by mid-century American realism, European symbolism, and film noir, Hyman’s recent work is a study in light, imaginative juxtapositions, and a record of personal geography. Accompanying his paintings will be a selection of original comic strip drawings from graphic novel adaptations of Hyman’s grandmother Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery, James Ellroy’s The Black Dahlia, among others. Narrative Images will be on view from May 13 – June 26, 2021 with an opening reception on May 13th from 11 AM to 9 PM.
The exhibition presents two painting series Crash and East Coast Light. In the ongoing painting series, Crash, Hyman creates imaginative dichotomies of figure and landscape. An elusive, potentially quixotic relationship forms between female characters seemingly unfixed in time, and similarly enigmatic vehicle wreckage behind them. The characters at times appear to be plucked from other worlds, while others seemingly have a more direct tie to the dramatic scene appearing over their shoulder.
Within East Coast Light, a suite of paintings depicts fictional characters at various locations throughout New York City. The subject matter highlights the importance the city has to Miles Hyman, a locus steeped with childhood and adolescent memories, and a source of development for him as an artist. To this day, the historical resonance and constantly evolving landscape, coupled with a quality of light unique to metropolises, continues to provide a wellspring of inspiration for the artist.
Accompanying Hyman’s paintings will be original charcoal drawings from several of his graphic novels, most notably The Lottery. In 2016, Hyman released the graphic novel adaption to his grandmother Shirley Jackson’s critically acclaimed 1948 short story. In what Hyman aptly termed “a feat of inter-disciplinary acrobatics”, he had the overwhelming task to create a visual expression from words on a page and to keep the novel’s nuances and the secrets intact for the reader. Hyman viewed the undertaking as a way to rediscover one of Jackson’s greatest works and allowed him “to affirm a tangible link to her life and work in a way that was both professional and deeply personal.” The ability to pair his grandmother’s word with his drawing is a familial pairing like no other.
Miles Hyman was born in Vermont in 1962, and currently lives and works in Paris. Hyman studied drawing and printmaking with David Schorr at Wesleyan University in Connecticut before attending Paris’ Ecole des Beaux-Arts. His works have been exhibited in museums including the Palais de Tokyo, the Glénat Foundation, Rome’s Institute of Graphic Arts and the French Musée de l’Illustration. In 2017, he was awarded the prestigious Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture. Hyman’s drawings are featured by international publishers such as Simon & Schuster, Viking, Farrar Straus & Giroux, Gallimard, and Chronicle Books. His work has also appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Futuropolis, and a specially commissioned project with Louis Vuitton.
