The Californian idealism of Kenton Nelson.

Kenton Nelson was born in Los Angeles in 1954. His great uncle was Roberto Montenegro, a Mexican muralist and friend of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo. He attended Long Beach State University and then the Otis Parsons Art Institute, before running an art studio in Pasadena for more than thirty years.

“Problem”, oil on canvas

The American painter and muralist, Kenton Nelson invites us into his idealised post-war California, born of his childhood dreams. Characters, objects, landscapes and architecture rediscover the sparkle of yesteryear in scenes of the beach and everyday life bathed in sunshine, colour and sensuality.

“With regulation”, oil on canvas

Kenton Nelson‘s work is all about turning the past into a reinvention, an ideal of life and well-being in the present. This former graphic designer and commercial illustrator took a decisive turn in his career in the early 90s to become an accomplished and leading independent painter, muralist and mosaicist. He inherited his love of art from his great-uncle, Mexican muralist Roberto Montenegro.

From his studio in his home town, Pasadena, Kenton Nelson imagines calm, soothing retro stories in which his ordinary characters become glittering American icons, evolving in an idyllic world frozen in time. At the heart of these scenes of the beach and everyday life, the women are queens, models and muses. Everyday heroines, sanctified like pin-ups but busy with their everyday activities or the most trivial ones. All these pictorial perfections, between light and shadow, exude boundless bliss and an implicit sensuality that is both graceful and refined.

“Bathing”, oil on canvas, 2019

“Depending on the ice chest”, oil on canvas

“Early transportation”, oil on canvas

“Suspender”, oil on canvas

In his own words, Kenton Nelson creates ‘a place where he prefers to be’, whose backward-looking vision reflects ‘a mythical, bucolic idealism of stylised, escapist images’. The United States has long been a major influence on the world’s visual culture. His compositions recall his childhood memories, the cinema and all the collective imagery of the 1950s and 60s, imbued with symbols, dreams, glossy clichés and promises of hope for a better future.

“Curiosity”, oil on canvas, 2004

“Standard of elegance”, oil on canvas, 2019

“Waterless”, oil on canvas, 2016

Kenton Nelson‘s idealised representation of the American Way of Life echoes the worlds of Grant Wood and Edward Hopper, from whom he claims primary inspiration. But also Louise Dahl-Wolfe and Thomas Hart Benton. A rich universe that draws on the social realism of the inter-war period, regionalism and the work of WPA (Works Progress Administration) artists in response to the Great Depression.

“Lunch”, oil on canvas, 2004

“Life”, oil on canvas

As one American art critic rightly pointed out, “his paintings resuscitate the sunny optimism of the New Deal”. Kenton Nelson‘s work has since appeared several times on the cover of the prestigious New Yorker, in several films, and has been exhibited in Los Angeles, London, Vienna, Zurich…