Sean Powers (b. 1992) is an American artist living and working in London, UK. He graduated with a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2014, and an MA Painting degree from the Royal College of Art in 2024.
His recent exhibitions include: Unsacred Terrains, Elias Tsiofas Gallery, Thessaloniki, GR; Slight of Hand, Me Paints Me; Waiting Room, Whiteshepherd Gallery, London, UK; Coda, Thameside Studios, London, UK; Backscatter, Chilli Art Projects, London, UK; The Watcher, J/M Gallery, London, UK; Omnipotence of Dreams, Salford Art Museum, Manchester, UK; Satellite Paradise, Rhett Baruch Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; Open Call 2024, Me Paints Me; RCA Painting Degree Show 2024, London, UK; Caper, Greatorex St., London, UK; Things That Matter, AMP Gallery, London, UK; Junctures, Chilli Art Projects, London, UK; Risovision, The Print Shop LA, Los Angeles, CA; Greetings From Home, Glorious Flaming Particles, The Print Shop LA, Los Angeles, CA. Sean’s work has been featured in Art 021 Shanghai with Xima Gallery and he’s also a recipient of the 2024 Cass Art Prize Student Award.
Painting is an existential dilemma caught in a cycle of reincarnation. It's a stereotype, a thixotropic material nostalgically recycling the same themes. I wonder if I look deeper into what painting is opposed to how it looks, I'll find a soul with principles but no form. I’m spellbound by painting’s foundational values, where transcendence is the intersection. That’s why I call these “ecotone paintings” because they have a likeness to this ecological concept. It’s where different realms of painting’s values meet and amalgamate. I’m looking for a painting that reflects a kinesthetic mercurial act of faith. Something that looks beyond determinism into metaphysical absurdity. I focus on observations that are conundrums, where it necessitates unorthodox technics to express them. The image is less important than its technics, which itself embodies the metaphysical condition. The further I push past solace, the more I grasp novelty barely within reach. This is the painting I'm looking for, a fingerprint of an incomprehensible finger.