Solovei Gallery Solo Exhibition March 2008
| Mike Adams | Sculpture | Paintings |
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Solovei Gallery Solo Exhibition March 2008 |
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These photographs were taken in the gallery on the afternoon of March 13, 2008 |
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Below is a panorama of the Solovei Art Gallery during my show. You have to scroll across the image after you click on it. Or try the Quick Time version which is 360 degrees. You have to download the free player from Apple.com and click and drag the image in the player to get it to start moving. |
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Below are photographs taken in the studio of many of the pieces in the show |
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Most images link to an enlarged version. |
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| The following is the artist's
statement that I wrote specifically for this show. I try to write a new one
for each exhibition, without looking at the old ones, to see if I can write
something new and pertinent: Art is complicated. Art is simple. The most profound artistic experience I’ve ever had as a viewer was seeing Wagner’s opera Die Walküre at Seattle Opera in August of 1986. I really didn’t understand the power of art until then, which was ironic, since it was the summer after I graduated from art school. I think it goes to show that you haven’t learned what you thought you’ve learned. Wagner’s approach of weaving together a nearly seamless musical form has been my model for many years. What strikes me with Wagner’s music is the way the musical ideas well up from the background, like dreams that are remembered after we awaken. The concept of subconscious ideas revealing themselves, breaking the surface, has been something that I’ve used in my art since that time. It may seem incongruous to use a musical metaphor when discussing the visual arts, but both stem from something we can’t fully grasp. People pretend they know, but it shows that they are lying. Interestingly enough, the kernel of the idea for this show, however, predates my Wagnerian fixation by only a month! I saw the Paris Opera Ballet at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City in July 1986. They performed some “reconstructed” dances accompanied by the music of Jean-Baptiste Lully, who was court composer to Louis XIV. The balance of the music, and the haunting melodies are actually the inspiration for the “Emancipated Landscapes,” which strictly speaking, only refers to the four white-and-black wood cut-outs in this show. They are dancing figures made literally from a landscape drawing that I cut-out and rearranged, freeing it. Something I realized while working on the pieces for this show is that I’m starting to look inside my mountain forms—revealing the heat inside the volcanoes—cutting away pieces to reveal the interior. This harkens back to my Wagnerian approach of having a sort of veneer representing what we see at first glance, and letting subconscious ideas percolate through it.
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| ©2008 by Mike Adams, all rights reserved. |
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