USEUM has partnered with Le Dame Art Gallery operating between London (UK) and Capri (Italy), to bring emerging talent in the areas of painting and illustration to the heart of the Art World in London. Le Dame Art Gallery will be exhibiting in various events the best of USEUM’s thousands of contemporary artists from 100 countries around the world. We are hosting USEUM's first ever gallery event on Tuesday the 6th of October at 6.30pm and the exhibition will be on display for one month on the first floor of the prestigious Meliã White House 5-star hotel in Regent’s Park.
This collection is comprised by the 23 artworks exhibited by USEUM and Le Dame Art Gallery, on the first floor of Meliã White House from the 7th of October to the 7th of November and by many more artworks that were very close to be selected.
Miss Molly 2015
Oil on wood · 49 x 49 cm (+4.5 cm frame)
£700 at the 1st USEUM exhibition
"There is something beautiful and alluring yet hauntingly sad about the portraits of the Ziegfeld Follies dancing girls of the 1920s – including this one, Miss Molly," says Kelly John Gough. "Their black and white portraits showcase the elegance and glamour for which they were cast in the lavish Ziegfeld Follies Broadway shows as dancers. Yet in every young woman's eyes and carefully constructed pose there is an aching loneliness and sense of melancholy and longing that gripped me. It inspired a series of portraits that I have completed, with Miss Molly being one of the first."
About the Artist: South African artist Kelly John Gough received his diploma in Graphic Design in 1995, after which he worked in publishing and production for twelve years. From 2002 to 2007he painted as a patron under Andre Redinger. Gough works mainly with oil paint on raw wood panels, which allows for the wood grains to blend with the skin of his subjects. Cough’s nudes are bold, intimate and at times, erotic. They radiate both strength and vulnerability, and his portraits capture the core of the subjects. Gough’s artworks include both ready-to-hang works and commis- sions, and have been exhibited in galleries throughout Cape Town and Johannesburg.
text by Jesse Voetman