A painting by Emma McIntyre
A painting by Emma McIntyre

Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain

David Zwirner is pleased to present a solo exhibition of new paintings by New Zealand–born, Los Angeles–based artist Emma McIntyre at the gallery’s 69th Street location. This will be the artist’s first exhibition in New York. 

McIntyre’s protean canvases evolve alchemically, transformed by the artist’s interventions and the unbridled organic interactions of her chosen materials: oil, together with unconventional substances like oxidized iron. She begins by pouring paint from above, letting her colors pool, splash, and stretch across her substrate. The artist then reorients her supports and, in a process that is at once intuitive and revelatory, applies additional layers of paint, further modifying her surfaces using brushes, rags, or parts of her body. McIntyre pairs her extemporaneous modes of creation with a repertoire of motifs and compositional strategies gleaned from a close study of art history. Atmospheric yet grounded, McIntyre’s compositions hover between spontaneity and deliberate action; effervescent at the surface, they exist at the edge of perception, forming and reforming before our eyes. 

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Image: Emma McIntyre, Queen of the air, 2023 (detail). Courtesy the artist, Château Shatto, Los Angeles, and David Zwirner, New York

Dates
September 21October 28, 2023
Gallery Hours
Tues—Sat 10am–6pm
An image of Emma McIntyre in her studio in Los Angeles, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio in Los Angeles, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio in Los Angeles, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

Prompted by her materials and guided by an index of mark-making, Emma McIntyre exposes the endless potential of painting. The artist’s protean canvases evolve alchemically, transformed both by her interventions and the unbridled organic interactions of her chosen materials: oil and resin, together with unconventional substances like oxidized iron. 

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

McIntyre begins by pouring paint from above, letting her colors pool, splash, and stretch across her substrate. She then reorients her supports and, in a process that is at once intuitive and revelatory, applies additional layers of paint, further modifying her surfaces using brushes, rags, or her own fingers.

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

“The technique at this point is improvisational, a lot of spontaneous action with various colors and brushes until the image starts to resolve itself. Sometimes it feels like I can almost see the finished work, and the painting process is about finding it.”

—Emma McIntyre

A Photo, of the artist, by Chantal Anderson

Photo by Chantal Anderson

Photo by Chantal Anderson

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

A detail of an artwork by Emma McIntyre, Laws of night and honey, dated 2023

Emma McIntyre, Laws of night and honey, 2023 (detail). Courtesy the artist, Château Shatto, Los Angeles, and David Zwirner, New York

Emma McIntyre, Laws of night and honey, 2023 (detail). Courtesy the artist, Château Shatto, Los Angeles, and David Zwirner, New York

Featured works in GIF: Joan Mitchell, Rivière, 1990 (detail). Collection of the Joan Mitchell Foundation. © Estate of Joan Mitchell; Cy Twombly, The Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, 1993–1994 (detail). Collection of The Museum of Modern Art. © 2023 Cy Twombly Foundation; Jean-Antoine Watteau, L’Embarquement pour Cythère, 1717 (detail). Collection of Musée du Louvre © 2010 RMN-Grand Palais (Musée du Louvre)/Stéphane Maréchalle; Sigmar Polke, Gespenst (Ghost), 1982 (detail). © The Estate of Sigmar Polke/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn, Germany

Featured works in GIF: Joan Mitchell, Rivière, 1990 (detail). Collection of the Joan Mitchell Foundation. © Estate of Joan Mitchell; Cy Twombly, The Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, 1993–1994 (detail). Collection of The Museum of Modern Art. © 2023 Cy Twombly Foundation. Image licensed by SCALA/Art Resource, NY; Jean-Antoine Watteau, L’Embarquement pour Cythère, 1717 (detail). Collection of Musée du Louvre. © 2010 RMN-Grand Palais (Musée du Louvre)/Stéphane Maréchalle; Sigmar Polke, Gespenst (Ghost), 1982 (detail). © The Estate of Sigmar Polke/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn, Germany

Featured works in GIF: Joan Mitchell, Rivière, 1990 (detail). Collection of the Joan Mitchell Foundation. © Estate of Joan Mitchell; Cy Twombly, The Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, 1993–1994 (detail). Collection of The Museum of Modern Art. © 2023 Cy Twombly Foundation. Image licensed by SCALA/Art Resource, NY; Jean-Antoine Watteau, L’Embarquement pour Cythère, 1717 (detail). Collection of Musée du Louvre. © 2010 RMN-Grand Palais (Musée du Louvre)/Stéphane Maréchalle; Sigmar Polke, Gespenst (Ghost), 1982 (detail). © The Estate of Sigmar Polke/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn, Germany

“I have my touch points in each movement, and Frankenthaler, Mitchell, Twombly, Bonnard, Watteau in particular are artists I come back to again and again. I am also very indebted to German painting. I look to Polke more than anyone else at the moment, and although my project is vastly different from his, his investment in paint as a material and his interest in pushing materiality to the absolute limits as well as his interest in alchemy is influential.”

—Emma McIntyre 

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Emma McIntyre in her studio with Queen of the air, 2023, Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio with Queen of the air, 2023, Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio with Queen of the air, 2023, Photo by Chantal Anderson

“Her paintings often dance around the edges, but close to their heart there is a pause, a rest, a sunny glade that pulls you right in.”

—Dean Kissick, Cultured

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner, New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Mitchell Image

Photo by Chantal Anderson

Photo by Chantal Anderson

“Believe in the mark. Make a flirty mark, one that brushes up against, rubs up against, one that uses its whole body to seduce. It’s easy to understand painting as witchcraft, when with a casual flick of the wrist, the wand-like animal-hair tipped brush in your hand reveals a cosmos of relative marks spanning millennia.”

—Emma McIntyre

An Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, dated 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

Installation view, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, David Zwirner New York, 2023

A photo of Emma McIntyre in her studio with Duets in the dust, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio with Duets in the dust, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

Emma McIntyre in her studio with Duets in the dust, 2023. Photo by Chantal Anderson

“I’m interested in a painting practice being a slippery, shifting, unnamable thing most of the time.”

—Emma McIntyre

Inquire About Works by Emma McIntyre

An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
An installation view of the exhibition, Emma McIntyre: An echo, a stain, at David Zwirner in New York, dated 2023.
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Doth mutation love, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Doth mutation love, 2023
Oil on linen
80 x 98 1/8 inches (203.2 x 249.2 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled The gospel of translucence, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

The gospel of translucence, 2023
Resin paint and oil on linen
16 x 18 inches (40.6 x 45.7 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Some pure word, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Some pure word, 2023
Oil on linen
18 1/8 x 20 inches (46 x 50.8 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Queen of the air, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Queen of the air, 2023
Oil on linen
98 x 70 inches (248.9 x 177.8 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Antipodean fragments, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Antipodean fragments, 2023
Oil and diamond dust on linen
12 x 15 inches (30.5 x 38.1 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Rustlers, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Rustlers, 2023
Acrylic, oil, and iron oxide on linen
12 x 14 inches (30.5 x 35.6 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Red, she said, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Red, she said, 2023
Oil on linen
16 x 14 inches (40.6 x 35.6 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Laws of night and honey, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Laws of night and honey, 2023
Oil on linen
98 x 70 inches (248.9 x 177.8 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Madonna of the Rose, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Madonna of the Rose, 2023
Oil, chalk pastel, and iron oxide on linen
24 1/8 x 20 inches (61.3 x 50.8 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Duets in the dust, dated 2023 (TBC).

Emma McIntyre

Duets in the dust, 2023
Oil, chalk pencil, and iron oxide on linen
86 1/8 x 63 1/8 inches (218.8 x 160.3 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Under stainless skies, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Under stainless skies, 2023
Oil on linen
12 x 16 inches (30.5 x 40.6 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Some pink and blue evening, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Some pink and blue evening, 2023
Oil and iron oxide on linen
12 x 14 inches (30.5 x 35.6 cm)
A painting by Emma McIntyre, titled Eros Hog, dated 2023.

Emma McIntyre

Eros Hog, 2023
Oil on linen
70 x 98 inches (177.8 x 248.9 cm)

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