MAY 18 - JUNE 30, 2016

Opening Reception with the Artist
Wednesday, May 18, 6 – 8 PM

Southern Comfort Gallery (SOCO Gallery) is pleased to present Just Down The Road, the latest paintings by Damian Stamer, to be shown in conjunction with his exhibition at the North Carolina Museum of Art. SOCO Gallery is located at 421 Providence Road in Charlotte, North Carolina. An artist reception will take place on May 18 from 6 - 8PM. The reception is free and open to the public. This will be the artist’s first time exhibiting with the gallery, and in Charlotte, North Carolina. 

Damian Stamer, who grew up in Durham, NC, sites Robert Rauschenberg, Gerhard Richter and Matthias Weischer as his major painting influences. His southern sensibility, combined with knowledge of contemporary painting, have been the foundation of his paintings for over a decade. Stamer revisits the South through photographs and memories of abandoned barns, open fields and isolated family homes that surrounded him throughout his childhood. He rebuilds these landscapes through layers of oil paints, which push and pull the images into existence. The richly worked surfaces of his paintings invite the viewer to discover highly detailed architectural structures hidden within the loose, gestural brushstrokes, as if Stamer painted his memories onto canvas with a common paint roller. “Ever since I read as a child The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, I've been fascinated by the idea of portals. These works play with a similar sense of magic and the attempt to freeze time, if only for a moment, to explore distant yet familiar lands.”

Damian Stamer (B. 1982, American)

Damian Stamer received his Master of Fine Arts from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as a Jacob K. Javits fellow in 2013 and his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Herberger Institute of Art and Design and Barrett, The Honors College at Arizona State University as a National Merit scholar in 2007. He also studied at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts as a Fulbright grantee, and the State Academy of Art and Design in Stuttgart, Germany as a Rotary Ambassadorial scholar. His work is currently featured in Altered Landscapes, a two person exhibition at the North Carolina Museum of Art, on view from April 16 through September 11, 2016. The artist lives and works in Brooklyn, New York, and Hillsborough, North Carolina.