For the final exhibition in our current space, 33 Bond Gallery is presenting “Simple Goodness”, an exhibition of new works by two emerging artists we love. The gallery is relocating to a larger space and for our last show we are celebrating the ease and straightforwardness of great art. Albeit vastly different in style, context, and media Gonzalez and Yoon’s works are simply compelling – no convoluted narrative, justifications, or explanation needed.

In the exhibition the two artists present portraits working entirely with black or white material and using existing images or sculptures as subjects. Gonzalez’s new paintings abandon color altogether and focus on the images of a woman’s stare using only black paint. Gonzalez borrows from images found in Mexican tabloid and porn magazines of the ‘70s, creating indistinct and haunting portraits. The paintings fluctuate between abstraction, minimal monochromes and figurative paintings depending on the perspective of the viewer.

Yoon’s installations use a clutter of lines to draw objects, appearing shifting and off-center, allowing her to capture the objects from a variety of perspectives at once. Her use of mylar reveals all of the steps in her work creating ghostlike impressions of the objects. In this series, she focuses on the heads and busts of classic Greek and Roman sculptures from the Metropolitan Museum sculpture collection.

The work could hardly be more different: painting versus installation, black versus white, and each focusing on subjects living at opposite ends of the “approval matrix”. Yet despite – or perhaps because of those contrasts Gonzalez and Yoon portraits of portraits create a striking dialog. Aesthetical debate? Imagined conversation between vintage porn stars and Roman gods? The dichotomy can be taken on multiple levels – visual, anthropological, aesthetical, but in the end these two artists manage to create pieces, which like all great works of art, raise a thousand questions without losing their raw simplicity and appeal.

Ricardo Gonzalez is a Mexican born painter; he received his MFA from New York University in 2008. His work has been included in numerous shows, including “Smash & Grab” Locust Projects, Miami, FL 2008, “Look Away” Cynthia Broan Gallery, New York, 2007 and “The Most Curatorial Biennial of the Universe”, Apexart, New York, NY, 2007. Ricardo Gonzalez lives and works in New York.

Heeseop Yoon is a Korean born artist she received he MFA from City College of New York and attended Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2005. Her work has been show in numerous exhibitions nationally and abroad. Currently her work is on view at Daily Projects in Seoul, Korea and Contemporary Art Space, Tasmania, Australia. Heeseop Yoon lives and works in New York.