Enn Erisalu
Painting
East Gallery

Canadian Artist

MEDIA RELEASE

Mercer Union, A Centre for Contemporary Visual Art is pleased to present an exhibition of paintings by Enn Erisalu.

Referring to Cubism, Constructivism and the Italian Metaphysical school, Enn Elisalu's previous paintings investigated the nature of illusion, optics and perception activated through abstraction. They addressed the contradictions of surface and depth, solidity and insubstantiality, and image and abstraction.

In his most recent works, Erisalu appears to have repudiated his earlier virtuosity in favour of a methodology that is random and anti-aesthetic. Commencing with the belief that rendering an image upon canvas limits the experience of the viewer, Erisalu has produced a series of paintings utilising language, words, numbers and letters, which identify the subject rather than drawing or painting it. In so doing, Erisalu provokes the viewer to realign the sequence of visual and verbal elements to construct meaning.

Enn Elisalu lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia. His most recent exhibitions include a solo exhibition at the 49th Parallel, New York and the "North West Survey ", Seattle Centre, Seattle. This is Erisalu's first solo exhibition in Toronto.