Exhibition//Austin Lee’s “Tomato Can” at Peres Projects

“It’s like I just walked out of a matinee, struck by sunlight,” remarked one viewer upon confronting the neon colors of Austin Lee’s air-brushed acrylic paintings at the opening of ‘Tomato Can’ his first exhibition with Peres Projects. Even more surprising than someone actually discussing the work at an opening is Lee’s ability to carve tension between line, space, and form with an analog paint brush atop air-brushed canvases. He marries youthful humor with masterful technique in works that lack the narrative theatricality of the matinee, but explore the gravity of bodies paused in action.