Selma Parlour depicts the limits of painting in order to celebrate both painting and the gallery. In her work she uses soft films of transparent oil paint so that colour is backlit, warm and parched, and looks as though it has been printed or drawn. Her process enables her to explore painting away from the gestural mark as well as facilitating her use of the material surface as a pictorial element. Her abstract diagrams of gallery spaces feature isolated components that are arranged to face the viewer head-on, as minimal scenery flats. The composition of some of her paintings creates an illusion of depth while acknowledging the flatness of the canvas, allowing the picture to be read as a flat surface, a box, a truncated pyramid or all three. ‘The game is as old as painting itself,’ comments Sarah Kent on her work at Bloomberg New Contemporaries (ICA 2011) ‘but Parlour’s handling is perfect.’
Having recently undertaken a PhD in Art at Goldsmiths College, Selma’s first solo show was hosted in 2012 at MOT International Projects, London.
