Julia Muggenburg is pleased to present Joel Tomlin’s first solo show at Belmacz.

In Calyx Horse, a show of recent work, Tomlin presents the viewer with an array of objects that are rooted in a semi mythical, Arcadian past, tempered with a grittiness that is born out of a 21st century urban reality.

Tomlin is a romantic realist who understands the power of myths and imbues his work with a suggestive narrative of lost gods and forgotten rituals. Echoes of Greek, Norse and Celtic legends are laced with modernist sensibilities and the echoes of experimental vitality found in African art. His pieces have a fetish quality, objects that are to be contemplated and that act as a depository for a collective longing for beauty and meaning — a shared memory of the absolute need for the sublime. His objects are paeans to lost times, imaginary idols to be placed in temples for day dreaming — a valuable rest bite for the over commodified and transient present.

His works speak of something solid and heartfelt, not the slick manufactured production and cold calculation in a lot of today’s contemporary art. He understands that his art has to be ‘crafted’ with a loving hand and a critical eye. His work always retains the imprint of the hand and the marks of the tools employed in their making. Base materials are forged into something higher, his work becomes a presence that demands attention.