Lara Nickel: 12 Horses: Homage to Jannis Kounellis

Lara Nickel's 12 life-size paintings of horses as a homage to Jannis Kounellis's Untitled (12 Horses) project. The Horse has been represented in the History of Art by almost every culture in every time period. In 1969, Jannis Kounellis (member of the Italian art movement Arte Povera) brought twelve living horses inside a gallery space in Rome, creating an awkward, dreamlike experience and a very re-interpreted image of the Horse in an art context. Lara Nickel's homage consists of twelve life-size horse paintings, all presented realistically with white backgrounds which mimic the neutral gallery wall. They are displayed in a similar manner to Kounellis' live horses: positioned on the ground and installed perpendicularly to the wall so they appear to be standing in the room, making the architectural space itself the setting of the painting. Lara Nickel was born and raised in New Mexico. She received her BFA in Painting with a Minor in Art History from the College of Santa Fe in 2007, after which she spent several years in Europe. Lara currently lives and works in New York City.