Tony Just

Tony Just works between drawing and painting, applying a mixture of gouache, ink, oil, graphite and various other media to books, walls and large canvases. Although he’s always worked in a somewhat loose visual register, the figurative components of his earlier works have come to be replaced with almost entirely abstract forms. Whilst dealing with his own depression, Just read Hans Fallada’s The Drinker (1950) which left an incredibly strong impression on the artist. Fallada’s lead protagonist struggles with heavy drinking and existentialism but finds peculiar solace in the beauty of his own tears. Inspired by the cathartic potential of this imagery, Just decided to pour a bottle of wine across the interior of a book standing on its spine, letting its contents organically fall through the pages. Once the liquid had dried, Just was struck by the delicacy of the ripples formed on the page and the shapes that were drafted in negative space. Repeating this process with coloured ink and gouache, Just was similarly entranced by the outcome of this chance act. Just continues to work with this method, enlarging shapes or gestures found within the books onto canvas. The resultant works are incredibly tender and evocative, capturing happenstance moments infused with immense emotional depth. Echoing the coincidental approach of Dadaists such as Hans Arp, Just’s paintings find comfort in unpredictability.