Simon Casson, one of the foremost voices in contemporary Postmodernism, presents The Floralia. Casson offers a deeply layered exploration of classical form and contemporary symbolism, drawing on his Royal Academy training in traditional oil painting. He subverts the subject through experimental composition, texture, and modern iconography. The result is a collection that forms a dialogue between art historical homage and contemporary commentary.
Simon Casson, one of the foremost voices in contemporary Postmodernism, presents The Floralia. Casson offers a deeply layered exploration of classical form and contemporary symbolism, drawing on his Royal Academy training in traditional oil painting. He subverts the subject through experimental composition, texture, and modern iconography. The result is a collection that forms a dialogue between art historical homage and contemporary commentary.
Artfully romping upon an imagined classical Roman stage, the characters of Casson’s paintings play out the Ludi Florales. Frolicking games with a smeary licentiousness, scattering beans and cavorting with hare and deer, such symbols of fertility and abundance, all in the name of the goddess Flora and the festival in her honour, braying to her for botanical protection.
Floral wreaths abound and nudity rules, broken and banded, swathes of colour, juxtaposing the customary white purity. Within the confines of the Circus Maximus, farces were wildly acted out, fleshy and overtly sexual. Concubines musing upon the curated memento mori. Stepping over the threshold of normality, phantasmal gladiatorial displays form a backdrop to the dalliances of the courtesans, fiercely embracing the proceedings as their very own.
