John Zurier »Mountains are feelings«
Mexico City, November 20, 2025 - December 14, 2025
Galerie Nordenhake Mexico City is pleased to present Mountains Are Feelings, the
second solo exhibition by American artist John Zurier (Santa Monica, California, 1956)
at this venue.
Mountains Are Feelings brings together a selection of works created by Zurier from 2019
to the present, painted in California and Iceland. More than half of these pieces were
painted in one of the artist’s studios in Iceland, specifically located at the foothills of a
mountain. Collectively, the works move beyond signaling specific themes, suggesting
instead connections between time and space, distance and proximity, and objective and
subjective states.
Zurier’s pictorial language explores the brushstroke as a structural element from which
layers of paint emerge: at times leaving the canvas exposed, while at other moments the
oil layers are superimposed like small hills within the painting. In his works, color and its
tonal degradations are also a material and perceptual exploration of how color operates
in the world and within the painting itself.
The exhibition title is inspired by Canto III of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1816) by the
English poet Lord Byron. Zurier plays with the quote: “High mountains are a feeling.” In
the context of the exhibition, the artist transfers the poetic meaning of the phrase to a
more personal, philosophical, and emotional state.
Mountains, the most ancient natural landscape, are situated conceptually and sensitively
within the abstract and pictorial language to which Zurier appeals. Their geology is
narrated through primitive memories, and their entity forms part of the cycle of time. We
experience these earth elevations contemplatively and sensitively, not only when observing
the passage of the seasons on the world around us but also as a recurring theme within
Zurier’s artistic and poetic interest.
The contemplation of the exhibition simulates the observation of a unified whole, much
like mountains frame the great landmass without compelling us to focus on one specific
meadow. Through the inherent ambiguity of abstract painting, Mountains Are Feelings
subtly guides the viewer toward a sensory reading. Collectively, the works demand the
observation of a mountain that has lived longer than we will ever know, orienting and
enriching the perceptions of those who contemplate the space where the painting exists.
