Marking the 5th anniversary of Marie Jose Gallery, we are delighted to present Beau Regard, the first solo exhibition of Jonathan Rockefeller.

Beau Regard is an exhibition about looking, and the pleasure of being allowed to look. The title

plays on two meanings: a beautiful view, and a beautiful gaze. Across Rockefeller’s paintings,

pools shimmer beneath impossible skies, landscapes stretch towards the horizon, and figures

linger in moments of solitude, intimacy and desire.

The figures in these paintings never look back at us. They gaze across the water, towards one

another, or somewhere beyond the frame. We become voyeurs: close enough to watch, but

never quite close enough to know. Rockefeller is a born storyteller, but he knows when to leave

the story untold. Desire and imagination occupy the space between what is seen and what is

withheld.

Rockefeller’s painterly language is distinctly his own, while drawing from the masters who came

before him. His neo-Fauvist sensibility recalls the luminous colour and expressive marks of

Derain; his bold, block-like passages of paint evoke de Staël; while his fascination with pools

recalls Hockney. These influences converge in a visual language that is contemporary,

cinematic, and immediately recognisable.

Rockefeller came to painting through film. He spent his formative years as an apprentice to Baz

Luhrmann before spending a decade directing animation. His hand-drawn short A Little Death

premiered at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival. His cinematic sensibility remains

embedded in his paintings: in their framing, pacing and atmosphere, and in their sense of

narrative continuing beyond the edge of the canvas.

Born in Australia, Rockefeller is now based between New York and London. Beau Regard

marks his first solo exhibition in London, bringing together a body of work that moves between

the languid, the voyeuristic and the quietly erotic - paintings that invite us to look, linger, and

indulge.

SELECTED WORKS