Connecting Outcomes

Opening on 16 January 2025, the group exhibition Connecting Outcomes at Maddox Gallery Berkeley Street invites viewers to delve into the transformative essence of an artist’s practice. Through diverse techniques, approaches and visual languages, the show reveals how artists provoke the viewer into seeing or experiencing the world through a different lens.

With Connecting Outcomes, Maddox is delighted to welcome two new artists into the fold. The exhibition opens with a series of abstract works by bErto, an American contemporary artist whose creative journey is grounded in the natural world. With his visceral, instinctive exploration of form and texture, his works rely heavily on vibrant and contrasting colours to convey humankind’s unbreakable bond with the natural world.

The evolving relationship between his life and art is central to bErto’s practice. Soon to be relocating to Lisbon from Los Angeles to chase some of the biggest waves in Europe due to his love of surfing, the sense of focus and freedom he experiences on a surfboard mirrors his creative process. Both are about flow and connection, whether it’s riding a wave or layering paint on a blank canvas.

Also making his Maddox debut is François Bonnel, whose process of becoming an artist has taken him from the world of advertising to that of abstract art. Still at the stage where he is refining his practice and exploring new ways to incorporate natural forms into his pieces, he works with basic shapes—circles, bands and blocks of colour. Rooted in geometric abstraction, with elements of colour field painting, the beauty of Bonnel’s practice lies in its spontaneity and minimalism. Celebrating simplicity and purity of form with his vivid and contemplative use of paint, every element on the canvas is harmonious, transporting the viewer elsewhere, to a place of serenity and positivity.

The works of Jessica Brilli draw the focus away from abstraction and into the real world. Stepping back in time to mid-20th century suburban America, Brilli’s soulful paintings reimagine found photographs. Like the diamond-dusted works of Russell Young, which are displayed alongside, the sense of nostalgia is strong. Through her sensitive application of paint, Brilli reminds us of the universality of lived experiences, while with Marilyn Crying (Siren Blue), Young forces us to face uncomfortable truths about the fragility of fame. Together, they capture the power of art to serve as a bridge between the present and the past and communicate a bittersweet longing for days gone by that is universal to us all.

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