Denyse Thomasos: just beyond

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Denyse Thomasos, "Metropolis," 2007

acrylic, charcoal, porous-point marker on canvas, 214 x 335.6 x 3.5 cm. Collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario. Purchased with the assistance of the Toronto International Art Fair 2007 Opening Night Preview, and with the Financial Support of the Canada Council for the Arts Acquisition Assistance Program, 2008. © Denyse Thomasos Estate and Olga Korper Gallery.

One of the finest painters to emerge in the 1990s, the late Trinidadian-Canadian artist Denyse Thomasos (1964-2012) left an indelible, yet frequently overlooked, mark on contemporary painting.

A career retrospective, Denyse Thomasos: just beyond brings together more than 70 paintings and works on paper, many rarely seen, to show how she challenged the limits of abstraction, infusing personal and political content onto her canvases through the innovative use of formalist techniques. Through pattern, scale and repetition, Thomasos conveys the vastness of events such as the transatlantic slave trade without exploiting the images of those who were most affected.

The exhibition features sections devoted to the artist’s primary areas of research, illustrated with major works on loan from museums and private collections in Toronto, Montreal and New York City. Working closely with her family and gallerist, curators are supplementing the exhibition with sketches, photographs and newly uncovered documentary footage of Thomasos working in her studio.

The exhibition will also be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue, co-published by Remai Modern, the AGO and DelMonico Books • D.A.P., and co-edited by exhibition curators Michelle Jacques, Head of Exhibitions & Collections/Chief Curator, Remai Modern; Renée van der Avoird, Associate Curator, Canadian Art, AGO; and Sally Frater, Curator of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Guelph.