Brooklyn-based artist Nicolas Holiber, renowned for his large-scale mixed-media work, inaugurates his new solo exhibition Shape-Shifter at Unit London. Holiber’s new body of work presents a collection of large and small scale impasto-style paintings bringing a fresh and fluid sense of ethereal motion. In Shape-Shifter, the artist delivers a heightened level of emotional intensity, painting his subjects as fleshy, warped, and open masses, revealing the complicated intricacy behind the human facade.

This show marks the first time Holiber works from life; drawing inspiration from Francis Bacon’s iconic portraiture, we find some of his close friends and the artist himself as subjects - their facial features consumed by voluptuous brushes of vibrant colors stemming from his intuitive process of composition.

Like a Shape-Shifter, the works move and transform simultaneously in a batter of expressions both terrifying and pleasing. These new pieces invite us to look beyond superficial aesthetics to get a peek into raw human emotion, asking us how willing we are to look beyond someone or something at face value in order to reach alternate perspectives and find a new sense of reconciliation.

Shape-Shifter opens 26 April, 2022 at Unit London and will run until 28 May 2022