“Both the advantage and the privilege of an artist is that he is forced to look. To see. People rarely see the beauty and the greatness around them.”
About
Nathan Brad Hall lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. With a background in both abstract and figurative studies, his focus today is on figurative oil painting, attempting to capture the light that illuminates us all.
He has shown his work extensively in group and solo exhibitions in NYC and beyond, and can be found in private collections across the U.S. and internationally.
Press Release from the Zillman Art Musuem
Gold Dust features a series of recent works by New York City-based artist Nathan Brad Hall. The artist is known for his realistically rendered portraits and figures. The majority of the paintings and drawings were created in 2022 and 2023 and are being exhibited for the first time in this solo-exhibition. Hall’s on-going preference for painting large canvases is demonstrated in Gold Dust, with the largest composition, King, spanning 80 x 120 inches. Hall states that he wishes to offer “glimpses into the intensity and vulnerability of being human. Working at a sizable scale allows the viewer to be enveloped in the figure’s deep humanity”.
Hall’s use of strong directional light is a hallmark of his paintings as his subjects seem to emerge from darkened environments. For instance, in the recent 2022 large-scale portrait, Wait for Me, the facial features of his red-haired subject are partially obscured in shadow. Hall states, “This interplay of light and shadow, paired with the complexity and illusion of color, drives me to capture these temporal moments with the fluidity of paint”. When the painter’s intense light source rakes over his subjects, the results are dramatic. In Kingdom Come, a shard of diagonal light illuminates the hair and forehead of his handsome sitter, while the remaining facial features, neck, and tattered t-shirt are shrouded within the shadow.
While Hall’s depictions may at first-glance seem hyper-realist in execution, the artist’s selective use of thickly modeled paint passages add a more intuitive and textural dimension to the surface. Hall states, “Using both expressive and refined brush strokes of various thickness, my work uses the physical nature of oil paint to explore the balance of energy and stillness that can make the human figure come alive”.
Solo Exhibitons
Gold Dust
Zillman Art Museum / Bangor, Maine
May 19 - August 19, 2023
Lost, Love
Woodman Shimko Gallery / Provincetown
Summer 2019
Light Transcended
Cluster Gallery / Brooklyn
January 6-27, 2018
With photographer Brooke White
Select Group & Gallery Exhibitions
Woodman Shimko Gallery
Provincetown / Palm Springs
2018 - 2022
35 x 35 Project
Copelouzos Family Art Museum
Athens, Greece / Spring 2020
30th Annual International Exhibition
Viridian Artist Gallery / Manhattan
July 23 - Aug 10, 2019
8th Anniversary Figurative Exhibition
Dacia Gallery / Manhattan
September 19-29, 2018
Faces Exhibition:
Site:Brooklyn Gallery / Brooklyn
May 25-June 24, 2018
Wide Open 9
BWAC Gallery / Brooklyn
May 12-June 17, 2018